The gun maker, Kirk Kjellberg of Monticello, told KARE11 that he’s grown tired of people staring at him when he is wearing his gun.

“I walked towards the restroom and a little child, a boy about 7, saw me and said, ‘Mommy, mommy, that guy’s gotta gun,'” he said. “The whole restaurant of course turns and stares at you and I thought, ‘There’s just gotta be something better to do than this.'”

The gun, as advertised on his website, is designed to look just like a smartphone — “so your new pistol will easily blend in with today’s environment.”

Kjellberg said the prototype will be done in June and will likely be manufactured in October. So far, he said he’s had plenty of interest — more than 4,000 requests, he claims, including from law enforcement.

Today’s Question: Should gun makers be allowed to create handguns that look like cellphones?

Related Questions

Since we seem to be in the subsidy game why not direct some money to a home state company to help offset the enormous energy appetite that this stadium will have? Seems to me the Vikings and the NFL could gain some positive publicity for adding at least a token effort to decrease demand on coal fired energy.

PaulJ

nope – actually handguns should all be hot pink with a black tape showing that the safety is on. I mean, they aren’t a fashion accessory.

KTN

If the guy is so embarrassed by his gun, why does he wear it. Oh, that’s right, he’s afraid of everything.

Mitch Berg

Non-sequitur.

Ralphy

I agree with Paul J
If anything, guns should be highly visible so there can be no mistake.
A cellphone gun is a virtual guarantee that one will be illegally brought into a school, office, stadium or store by someone who doesn’t want it known.
How would a police officer know if they are in imminent danger or someone is innocently holding a cellphone?

Gary F

So you are in favor of open carry?

Ralphy

I’m in favor of a gun being readily identifiable so there is no mistaking it by law enforcement officers or others in the area. Blaze orange or hot pink, that glows in the dark, would be a good idea.

Gary F

So to be mistaken for toys and air soft guns?

Mitch Berg

That’s one of VERY few non-market arguments against this “invention”; it dilutes the deterrent value that a gun has.

Criminologist Gary Kleck estimated that in something like 98% of defensive gun uses, no shots are fired – because the criminal sees the gun and re-evaluates his/her life’s priorities right then and there.

If I were to draw a gun on a miscreant, I want there to be NO mistake what I’m holding.

(If I ever were to own a gun, which I won’t, because they’re scary and Heather Martens says they’re bad, and she never lies).

John Dilligaf

It’s quite easy to conceal many smaller handguns that are designed for concealed carry. I can virtually guarantee Ralphy that many have been brought into his presence without his knowledge by responsible citizens. Responsible citizens who are licensed to carry are far more law abiding than the general population.

It’s not about whether a gun can be concealed, but whether it can be disguised. If I start pulling out my cell phone while talking to a cop, will I get shot, because it looks like it might be one of these guns? As long as guns look like guns, I’m relatively safe from such risks.

Will

That happens already due to abysmal police training.

Ralphy

A responsible citizen would not bring a gun to a place that is not allowed – such as a school, office, stadium or store. I have witnessed guns illegally carried into banned venues, and no doubt have not seen many more. Exactly my point – a disguised gun will only serve to encourage and enable someone to illegally bring a gun into a forbidden area. Putting us all at risk.
You can argue opening these places up to allow guns, but that is a different conversation for another time.

Andrew Rothman

Consider the strong possibility that you misunderstand the law. There are very few places in Minnesota where a person breaks the law by carrying a firearm.

Gary F

Anyone who thinks they are safer in a “gun free zone” is naive.

Ralphy

Anyone who thinks they have the right to carry a gun anywhere they want, regardless of a posted no guns allowed sign is not acting responsibly or respectfully.
Anyone who thinks they need to carry everywhere they go is paranoid.

Gary F

That’s correct, people still carry whether there is a sign or not.

LilAsil

So, now who’s the bad guy with the gun and who’s the good guy?

Ralphy

If one carries a gun, then No doesn’t mean No. Responsible and respectful.
Got it. Thanks.

Ruckabumpkus

Right. That’s why Amish communities are so extremely dangerous.

KTN

Went for lunch a while back with a friend, and one of his friends, who I had not met before. the guy is a former FBI agent, and carries two guns on him at all times (plus a knife), no he’s not paranoid. Anyway, he is presumably one of those responsible conceal carry holders, and yet, he carries everywhere he goes, regardless of signs telling him firearms are not allowed – I guess he, like most permit holders believe they are above the law.
I do know who carries – the paranoid and fearful of everything. Pretty simple.

Mitch Berg

Nope, no bigotry there.

KTN

What is your point, assuming you have one.
Do people carry because the gun is comfortable and cozy to have on their hip. Or, do they carry because they are afraid. Fear is the only reason, otherwise, why would you carry.

Mitch Berg

I *always* have a point*.

We’ve had this “discussion” before. You believe fear is the only reason to carry. I’ve pointed out many other reasons. You continue carrying on with your prejudices. You’re wrong, and you don’t really care to think about it beyond that.

You remember what Mark Twain said about arguing with a pig, right?

KTN

Cool, when you’ve got nothing else, use name calling. good on ya sport.

Mitch Berg

You’ve provided no facts to debate. Just your bigotry.

And I wasn’t calling you a name. I was referring to a well-known parable.

Care to argue facts, and lose an actual fair battle?

KTN

What bigotry. Do you think I’m anti gun. I’m not. Just inherited a lovely Wetherby 232, with a very snazzy Leopold scope. Beautiful inlays, really a pretty gun. A Wetherby 460 (what the hell am I going to do with an elephant rifle, but I’ve got one. A Rugar Blackhawk, and an H&K 242 composite assault rifle (which I’m going to have destroyed – it serves no purpose in civilian life.).
What I do believe is those who carry are paranoid, and afraid of their own shadows. They have an inflated sense of their own abilities. It’s the cowboy attitude, but unfortunately, very few (if any) permit holders are also trained in highly tense situations. They just believe since they have a gun, they can handle anything that comes their way. They cannot, but that gun gives them a false sense of security, and that’s dangerous – to them and to me.

LilAsil

Gun owner and hunter here and I feel the exact same way. I can’t imagine living as fearfully as some folks do here.

J F Hanson

And I certainly can’t imagine living with such presumption about the motivations of those who carry.

LilAsil

When people state their reasons for carrying as preparation for an attack and they feel so strongly about it that as some in this article state, they always have to be armed – it implies they feel unable to exist or go anywhere without it. Fearful, anxious, whatever you want to call it, it’s a reality.

J F Hanson

Your presumption that ‘fear’ is the only reason is merely an a priori belief of yours, conditioned on a number of assumptions about reality. And, many of those assumptions rest in the use of our conventions of conversation.

What you call ‘fear’ others would call preparation.

KTN

Preparation for what. Are you going to be what the jihadists at the NRA call a “good guy with a gun”, ready to stop the next mass shooting with all of your expertise in highly tense situations. hardly, you will cower just like everyone else, or be shot by the police, who will be looking for the guy with a gun – that’s you. But go get em, ain’t nothing stopping you.

J F Hanson

I know of no jihadists at the NRA.

I hardly worry about the next “mass shooting;” but I do have the option for this kind of defense if I need it.

Citations, please, for the number of ‘good guys’ shot by the police.

You’ve been indulging in Nanny’s fantasies far too much.

KTN

I do sometimes fantasize about nannies, Usually wearing a French maid outfit and little else.

The NRA is a domestic terrorist organization, peddling fear and paranoia to the weak minded (but heavily armed). They are so bereft of intelligent thought, they are unable to admit that gun rights at the federal level have increased under the current scary black president, who apparently was supposed to be coming for their guns. Before you ask for the cite. here you go.https://www.govtrack.us/congress/bills/111/hr627/text

J F Hanson

bwahahahahaha!

You certainly are entitled to have that opinion. It does clarify, however, the mindset of one who clearly is susceptible to leftist propaganda.

KTN

I’m editing this because I realize opening the link will
bring you to HR 627, The Credit Card Reform Act, and you might be wondering, why is this relevant. The Republicans, knowing they would otherwise fail in getting gun rights expanded, inserted language in an otherwise solid bill on credit card and other financial reform. Broad bipartisan support, and yet, here in it’s awkward glory is Sec 512 of that bill

Sec 512 reads: Protecting Americans from Violent Crime. This
section follows logically Sec 511, which reads: Federal Trade Commission Rules Making on Mortgage Lending. Nothing strange there, crime should always follow mortgage lending in Credit Card bills.
But there it is, and Obama signed it into law. Now all those millions of acres previously off limits to firearms, were now open.

LilAsil

Quick, find a dictionary!

Ruckabumpkus

So, how is it “bigotry” to suspect that when someone is obsessed with guns, there’s something amiss? It’s one thing to consider them perhaps an unfortunate necessity, given that so many criminals have them, but carrying one all the time is just paranoid.

Will

He is following the law. The Bill of Rights trumps other laws.

Ruckabumpkus

“Think you know who carries?” Evidently, based on recent comments (not yours), it’s people who make or approve of insensitive, biggoted, hateful jokes against those they disagree with. I have yet to see any gun activist object to the recent posts by OHJonesey, et al. Care to be the first? Because people on your side who do that are hurting your cause.

? OHJonesy

Son, the internet is a tough place. If you can dish it out, you’d better learn to take it.

I have as much right to say your words offend me as you have to offend me with your words. You’re being a hypocrite when you complain that complaints about your offensive speech constitute an infringement on your free speech rights.

Did I say I thought you were offended? No. But you were implying that it was an infringement on free speech rights for me to complain about others’ offensive speech. You gun zealots keep consistently misconstruing the comments of those who disagree with you. If that’s not deliberate and an illegitimate debate tactic, then it probably comes from your having paranoid delusions about others being out to persecute you. Either way, if you’re trying to make a convincing case you should be trusted with guns, it’s not working.

What did I misunderstand? First you posted an image of Winston Churchill with a caption quoting him as saying, “Some people’s idea of free speech is that they are free to say what they like, but if anyone says anything back, that’s an outrage.” Then you posted a picture of a young woman with the caption, “Believes in free speech unless it offends her.” Finally, you posted a picture of a tough guy with the caption, “What if I told you being occasionally offended is a small price to pay for the right to freedom of speech.” Why would any reasonable person not interpret that a rebuke of my protestations about the offensiveness of someone else’s words? You’re the one who’s whining about the fact that I’m exercising my free speech rights to point out that others are being jerks by abusing their free speech rights. You have a right to be a jerk by saying offensive things, and I have a right to say that’s what you’re doing. Now YOU, quit whining.

And btw, what’s with the copied and pasted images? Looks to me like you’re not clever enough to express your ideas in your own words, so you have to rely on stuff previously produced by others. So, do you gun zealots have a catalog of such stuff you can choose from to fit what you perceive to be the occasion, so you can seem more clever than you are? I’ve found most of the images you and others have used on Google Images, multiple times. Come on. Be a man and speak for yourself, instead of parroting your party line.

GAU-8

You are a boring little troll, goodbye

Ruckabumpkus

If you call someone a troll after getting worked up about their comments and responding with a string of inflamed and inflamatory replies, aren’t you admitting that you took the bait? So who’s the bigger fool?

No he didn’t. At all. He said the exact opposite, that being offended is one of the prices for free speech.

Talk about misconstruing words.

Try again.

Ruckabumpkus

I have as much right to say that your speech offends me as you have to offend me with your speech, so don’t object when I do, because when you do, you’re saying you don’t really believe in free speech as much as you say you do. Your freedom of speech does not entitle you to be free of criticism for what you say.

cargosquid

That IS what he said.

More than once.

Ruckabumpkus

When I think of how often you gun nuts cry fouls when folks suggest that your attachment to guns is to compensate for your sexual insecurities or shortcomings or other psychological hangups, it strikes me as awfully hypocritical of you to assert your right to belittle me in even more insulting ways.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Are you suffering from delusions of offense? I don’t think I understand what you’re trying to say.

Ruckabumpkus

Then you haven’t read the posts I’m referring to.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Got it. Yours and Dilligaf’s accounts are private so I had to waste my time on OHJonesey’s dashboard, someone whose maintenance of decorum I’ve always admired.

I see the problem now. Thanks for the wild goose chase, though. You could have been forthcoming and just admitted you’re a mouthy, whiney, know-nothing punk who probably doesn’t know when to STFU.

John Dilligaf

Yes, it was insensitive, and had it been directed at me, maybe I’d be offended. God knows I had enough of that kind of crap thrown my direction throughout school days. Truth be told, though, we’re all a little too sensitive about who can say what these days. We don’t need more safe spaces and trigger warnings, we need to be able to face issues directly without worrying about offending some protected category of human being. We’re all worthy of protection or offense. What do you say you, me and @sue_de_nim:disqus hit the gun range tomorrow afternoon and solve all the world’s problems by sending some lead downrange at some inoffensive paper targets – maybe some blank tax forms or something?

Ruckabumpkus

I’d like to, but I have a prior commitment. Thanks for the support.

Sue de Nim

I also have a prior commitment. Sounds like fun, though.

Sue de Nim

There’s probably no way to prevent it. The gun nuts have been so successful at removing limits on weapons over the years, there’s almost no point in trying to control them any more. The proverbial horse is out of the barn. Except for hunting and target shooting, I’ve never carried a gun. In all my years, I’ve never been in a situation where I wished I’d had one or where having one would have been at all helpful. Unless you’re in law enforcement, the military, or some kind of security business, you probably don’t need to carry a gun. I have to wonder about the emotional maturity of people who insist on carrying just because they can.

Mitch Berg

“Unless you’re in law enforcement, the military, or some kind of security business, you probably don’t need to carry a gun.”

Unless you have a fire in your house, you don’t need a fire extinguisher.

Unless you crash your car, you don’t need insurance.

I mean, I”m glad your life has dealt you nothing but good cards so far; may it ever be thus.

And carrying a firearm isn’t just about reacting to threats against *you*; it’s a societal deterrent.

And it works, ESPECIALLY in Minnesota; we have a higher rate of carry permits than Texas, and some of the lowest violent crime rates in the US.

Sue de Nim

In case you hadn’t noticed, a gun is nothing like a fire extinguisher. I’m not sure on what basis you’ve determined that I’ve had “nothing but good cards so far,” but you are much mistaken about that. But of course, the pro-gun ideology holds that it must be the case that guns make things better, so if I’ve never experienced that, I must be lucky, right? As for the factoid in that last paragraph, correlation is not causation. Pro-gun activists have been mining the data in search of “evidence” to support their cause for years. If you mine enough data, you can always find such correlations. It proves nothing.

Mitch Berg

“In case you hadn’t noticed,”

Ooh, unearned condescension! *Great* start!

“a gun is nothing like a fire extinguisher.”

In the sense that both are prudent preparations for unseen emergencies, they are *exactly* the same.

” I’m not sure on what basis you’ve determined that I’ve had “nothing but good cards so far,”

Your statement that you’ve never been in a situation where you needed a gun. Bully for you. I have.

“But of course, the pro-gun ideology holds that it must be the case that guns make things better, so if I’ve never experienced that, I must be lucky, right?”

That’s entirely your call.

And “guns make things better” is a strawman. Guns are a tool. No more, no less.

” Pro-gun activists have been mining the data in search of “evidence” to support their cause for years. If you mine enough data, you can always find such correlations. It proves nothing.”

So say you. And you are…?

Evidence is what we’ve got. You have…? What?

Sue de Nim

There’s a big difference between extinguishing fires and extinguishing a human life, don’t you think? And no, evidence is not what you’ve got. I read the debates about this and all I see is dueling “evidence” put forth by ideologues looking to make the case for what they want to believe. Whether you think Australia’s experience with gun control is a success, for instance, seems to depend almost entirely on what you want the evidence to say.

Mitch Berg

“There’s a big difference between extinguishing fires and extinguishing a human life, don’t you think? ”

Sure.

But if the shooting is *justifiable self-defense”, then it’s the second-worst possible outcome. Or do you believe innocent people should just shut up and die quietly?

“I read the debates about this and all I see is dueling “evidence” put forth by ideologues looking to make the case for what they want to believe.”

You can lead a horse to water…

I’d be interested in your answer to my question. Do you believe that homicide CAN be justified?

Or should victims just shut up and let themselves be raped, robbed and killed?

Because by law, that literally IS the choice.

Sue de Nim

Oh, I have been convinced by the evidence that strict gun control is pointless. What I haven’t been convinced of is that absolute libertarianism on guns is good public policy. While it’s true that “if guns are outlawed, only outlaws will have guns,” it’s also true that if guns are too freely available, then all the outlaws will have guns. If it’s true that “guns don’t kill people; people kill people,” then it’s good public policy to have some restrictions on who is allowed access to guns. Only a pro-gun ideologue would deny that.

Mitch Berg

Where did anyone say there should be no restrictions on who can get a gun?

Seriously?

Sue de Nim

2nd Amendment fundamentalists say that all the time. They argue that the slightest bit of gun control is a slippery slope toward confiscation and tyranny. Pay attention. They’re some of the loudest voices in these discussions.

Mitch Berg

You’re speaking hopelessly broadly. Care to get specific? Because *many* specific proposals that are aimed (and can be aimed) only at the law-abiding citizen *are* necessary steps toward confiscation.

You wanna talk specfiics? Bring ’em.

“Pay attention”? Oh, it’s so *cute* when people try to condescend to me on this issue. If you look into what the “loud voices” are saying, you’ll find almost inevitably that they are pointing out pointless regulations that can never affect crime and only infringe the law-abiding citizen’s rights.

Sue de Nim

Of course, you never write condescendingly toward those who disagree with you! (Hah!)

Mitch Berg

Eventually, sometimes I do. Absolutely. I’m only human.

Before I get there…:

1. I’ll have led with a TON of actual facts
2. The other side will have responded with condescension, straw men, ad hominen, and just plain fabrication.
3. In response? More fact!

Facts are not the only thing at issue. It is entirely a matter of opinion whether society would be better off with the carrying of firearms being normalized, or with the embrace of violence that such carrying implies being socially stigmatized.

Mitch Berg

Facts are not the only thing at issue, but I choose not to make public policy decisions based on emotional (and, factually, mistaken) reactions.

And given that Minnesota has a higher rate of concealed carry permitting than Texas, and an exceptionally low crime rate combined with effectively no problems resulting from law-abiding citizens exercising that right, I’d say “normalizing” is going pretty well. Certainly better than the alternative worked.

Sue de Nim

So, you’re not in favor of socially stigmatizing a culture of violence?

Mitch Berg

What “culture of violence” are you referring to?

Please be specific.

Sue de Nim

Just open your eyes.

Mitch Berg

No, you get specific.

But since you won’t – or can’t – I’ll do it for you.

You’re trying to impugn the law-abiding gun owner as part of a “culture of violence”.

So far this decade, Minnesotans have killed each other at a rate of about 2.3/100,000 people per year. They have committed violent crimes at a rate of about 200/100,000 per year.

In that same time, law-abiding Minnesotans with carry permits have committed homicides at a rate of exactly 0/100,000, and violent crimes at a rate so low that the BCA doesn’t measure it.

In case you missed it: *Almost No Violence*.

MPR’s audience is likely statistically more violence-prone than the average law-abiding gun owner.

Culture of violence? You open YOUR eyes. We’re the culture of peace, in *factual* terms.

You want to keep it emotional? That’s fine – so did the Klan, when facts were shown to be against them.

I have no more time for this today.

Sue de Nim

“MPR’s audience is likely statistically more violence-prone than the average law-abiding gun owner.”

I thought you were the one urging the citation of “facts.” Anyway, your comparison of Minnesota and Texas supports my point that violence is less related to how many folks are carrying guns than it is to the prevalence of the gun culture and the social toleration of violence. Having lived in both Texas and Minnesota (being a native of neither), I can tell you from experience, that Texas’ culture abhors violence a lot less than Minnesota’s does.

Mitch Berg

” thought you were the one urging the citation of “facts.” ”

Yep. I indulged in hyperbole.

But ZERO MURDERS THIS DECADE. This is your “culture of violence?”

The rest of your comment is evasion. The law-abiding citizen is NOT part of a culture of violence that can be determined in any factual way.

It’s just emotions at best, ignorance and bigotry at worst.

And now, I gotta get some work done.

Sue de Nim

Yeah, go get some work done. No one’s putting a gun to your head and demanding that you drag this out.

GAU-8

Texas CCL holders commit crimes at a rate 14x less than the general population. What culture of violence?

Sue de Nim

To be sure, a culture of violence is more prominent in the MMR community. But to deny that it exists is to be willfully blind.

GAU-8

What’s MMR? And what is a “culture of violence” and what research can you link to to prove your accusation?

Sue de Nim

Mixed Martial Arts. It’s kind of self-explanatory that there’s a culture of violence among that crowd.

GAU-8

“Culture of violence”. What is that? It’s a cute, pithy phrase. I have seen this definition: any aspect of a culture that can be used to legitimize violence in its direct or structural form.

Be capable of violence, is not having a culture of violence.
Some of the least violent people I have ever known are capable of the greatest violence –

GAU-8

Actually it might be opinion, but it’s just that opinion. Rights are not subject to opinion or even majority vote. We have a Republic specifically to avoid majority (mob) rule.

The actual crime rate of conceal permit holders is 14x less than the general public. That fact is exactly one major reason Chicago lost its court battle to block permitting

Sue de Nim

What I said there wasn’t about rights. It was about social attitudes.

GAU-8

You want laws set based on social attitude?

Sue de Nim

I wasn’t talking about laws. I was only talking about social norms. What’s legal and what’s normal are two different things. Sheesh, why do you folks always assume we gun skeptics want to enact new laws? You’re paranoid about government intrusion. I’d like it to be considered impolite (not illegal) to carry guns when it’s clearly not necessary.

GAU-8

No, you are just ambiguous. Ok, social attitudes. You don’t like guns, I accept that – it’s your right. Why can’t you accept I feel the exact opposite?

That’s typically the case. People who are pro-2A say “if you don’t like guns, fine then don’t have one.” It’s the other side that tries to impart their social beliefs.

So again, if you don’t like guns – fine. I am still keeping mine. How you “feel” doesn’t matter to me.

Ruckabumpkus

About those “specifics,” let’s first consider this: in the USA it is much too easy for people who should not have guns to get them. Do you agree or not? And if you don’t accept such an obvious premise, why should we take anything you have to say about gun policy seriously?

You gun activists are really good at shouting down others’ suggestions for how to make it harder for bad actors to get guns, but I’ve heard no actual suggestions from your side, even while you demand them from ours. The only suggestions I hear from the pro-gun camp are things like stiffer penalties, which only address gun violence after the fact and do nothing about prevention. The conclusion I reach is that gun activists, under the surface, don’t actually believe that it should be harder for anyone to get a gun. Some even seem to argue that we’d all be safer if guns were more freely available to everyone. Prove me wrong, please.

Mitch Berg

“About those “specifics,” let’s first consider this: in the USA it is much too easy for people who should not have guns to get them. Do you agree or not?”

It’s an utterly pointless statement, but sure. Why not?

“why should we take anything you have to say about gun policy seriously?”

If you set *that* up as *the sole litmus test* of credibility, then it’s you who shouldn’t be taken seriously.

The question isn’t’ whether it’s too easy for a criminal to get a gun; it’s true, in the US and pretty much everywhere in the world.

The question is “what do we do about that actually affects crime”, along with that whole “constitutional right’ bit. THAT is the question that separates the credible from the jabbering masses.

“You gun activists are really good at shouting down others’ suggestions for how to make it harder for bad actors to get guns”

Well, no. I mean, sure – there’s some shouters out there; every movement of millions of people has ’em. But for the most part – as we’ve seen in this thread – we quietly and efficiently show the left’s “suggestions” to be trifles that will not and can not affect crime, at all, ever, but will walk over our human right to self-defense.

“but I’ve heard no actual suggestions from your side, even while you demand them from ours. The only suggestions I hear from the pro-gun camp are things like stiffer penalties, which only address gun violence after the fact and do nothing about prevention.”

Again, untrue.

Gun crime has dropped 50% in the past 20 years – as gun laws liberalized (for the law-abiding) and got tougher (for the criminals). That WAS our suggestion, 30 years ago. It worked. The left doesn’t want to admit it – fights it, in fact – but it’s true.

“The conclusion I reach is that gun activists, under the surface, don’t actually believe that it should be harder for anyone to get a gun.”

Faulty facts and nonexistent evidence have led you to a nonsensical conclusion. It was suggestions that the Second Amendment Human Rights movement made thirty years ago that are largely responsible for the drop in crime today.

“Some even seem to argue that we’d all be safer if guns were more freely available to everyone.”

No, not “everyone”. Not felons. Not criminals. Not the deranged, or people who have non-felony violent convictions on their sheets.

It’s hard to take your side seriously when you all are so very very unclear on specifics.

“Prove me wrong, please.”

As opposed to what I’ve done at every turn in this discussion, you mean?

Prove *what* wrong? That we Real Americans want felons to have guns? WE are the ones that designed the system that has kept guns OUT of their hands the past 25 years (the NICS system was an NRA initiative). WE are the ones behind the upcharges for gun crimes. WE are the ones who’ve brought the accident rates down via training.

The anti-gun side is the one that’s suggested *nothing* to combat crime. And it shows; the worst crime cesspools in America – Chicago, Newark, Oakland, Baltimore and the like – have the worst crime. The places with the most guns per capita, including Minnesota, are the safest.

“Proof” is lost on you, apparently.

(To be fair, you’re no worse than the Twin Cities media)

Ruckabumpkus

Thank you. I’ve asked that question before, and seen it asked by others (“Do you agree…”), and you’re the first pro-gun activist I know of to admit that it actually is too easy for those who should not have guns to get them. Yes, the NICS system is a good idea (though I was under the impression that was part of the Brady Bill, not the gun lobby’s idea). That being the case, why is the NRA now so dead set against expanding it to cover all gun sales?

Mitch Berg

NICS was the result of a compromise that the NRA helped craft.
As to “covering all gun sales” – there’s the clinker. Most crime guns today come from straw purchases and guns obtained illegally or via the black market. The *vast* majority.

Requiring background checks will not, and can not, affect sales in back alleys and bar bathrooms and among criminals; criminals will not start transferring guns at dealers! And straw purchases, which pass background checks, are already a federal felony. “Universal” background checks are no more universal than they are today, because criminals won’t get them!

They WILL add to the price of guns for the law-abiding, and they will provide a back-door to registration, which is what enabled the UK and Australia to forcibly confiscate guns. But they won’t touch the black market.

It’s not that we oppose it just to be ornery. We oppose it because even basic logic tells you it can not work for the purpose it’s proposed, but can only work to undermine freedom.

Hope that answers your question.

Ruckabumpkus

No, it does not. By that logic, all background checks for guns are pointless, so NICS, which you earlier seemed to be saying actually helped, should be abandoned altogether. Which is it? You mention straw buyers as being a problem, but the NRA opposes efforts to crack down on them, too. So, we’re back to gun zealots basically arguing that keeping guns out of the hands of people who should not have them is an insoluble problem. As long as any inconvenience involved in law abiding citizens obtaining and keeping guns is viewed as an intolerable infringement of 2nd Amendment rights, that would be true, wouldn’t it?

It’s a fallacy to assert that because a measure won’t work perfectly it should not be taken. At least, if NICS checks were universal, criminals would have to go a little farther out of their way to find someone willing to violate the law and sell them guns. It wouldn’t stop all of them, but it would deter some.

Mitch Berg

So many things to address – and I really have to get to work so this is my last response on this thread for a bit, here:

“By that logic, all background checks for guns are pointless, so NICS, which you earlier seemed to be saying actually helped, should be abandoned altogether. Which is it?”

Ding ding ding. You’re learning!

NICS checks don’t stop criminals. They displace them; criminals who may, 40 years ago, have bought guns in gun shops, now buy them in bars or from friends of friends.

NICS checks basically *deny* criminals the easy use of the retail system to buy guns. It’s useful – but again, it is predicated on people *following the law*. Which criminals don’t. Which is why “universal background checks” are pointless.

“You mention straw buyers as being a problem, but the NRA opposes efforts to crack down on them, too.”

Now you’re making things up as you go along.

The NRA has led the way in going after straw buyers. The problem there is that straw purchases are a federal felony – but not an especially “sexy” one for a federal prosecutor to pursue. A woman with a clean record buying a gun for her gang-banger boyfriend? That’s not getting someone on the short list for attorney general.

“So, we’re back to gun zealots basically arguing that keeping guns out of the hands of people who should not have them is an insoluble problem.”

No. We’re back to “zealots” (the actual term is Real Americans) correctly pointing out that a government record-keeping program is not a panacaea for crime. Diligent law enforcement is the closest we’ve come to something that works.

And since crime is off 50% in the past 20 years, there’s something to that.

“It’s a fallacy to assert that because a measure won’t work perfectly it should not be taken.”

Sure. But it’s not a fallacy to assert that because a measure won’t work *at all* and *will* have “unintended” consequences that are unacceptable, it should not be taken.

“At least, if NICS checks were universal, criminals would have to go a little farther out of their way to find someone willing to violate the law and sell them guns.”

A “little” farther is an overstatement. It won’t change the business model of illegal gun trafficking one iota.

“And then there’s that slippery slope fallacy: registration is a prelude to confiscation. ”

It’s not a fallacy. In the UK this past week, it turns out that everyone who is a registered member of a gun club (the only legal way to own a gun over there anymore) somehow wound up on a terrorist watch list.

The slippery slope is not a fallacy. It is a law.

“Switzerland has registration, and no one there seems to be worried about confiscation being imminent”

Switzerland has no constitutional guarantee that the right to defend one’s self, family, property and civilization is given to the citizen by his or her creator.

The Swiss, in this case, are wrong.

Sue de Nim

I don’t know if “Ruckabumpkus” is right about “gun zealots” not being interested in keeping guns away from criminals, but that’s certainly where the financial interests of the gun industry lie. They have a perverse incentive to see the world become more dangerous. More violent crime leads to more gun sales. The Sandy Hook massacre was the best advertisement ever for the AR-15. The fact that violent crime has been going down in recent years has been bad for business, because fewer people see the need to own guns, so they’ve been pushing harder to make it easier to get them. I’m sure that no one in the gun industry will admit, even to themselves, that this perverse incentive has anything to do with their policy recommendations, but given that it exists, I have absolutely no confidence in the objectivity of any information coming out of their mouthpiece, the NRA.

Mitch Berg

Not only are you far, far, far off topic, but the “gun maker profit” meme is completely unhinged.

It shows us who the real zealots are; the antis.

Have a nice day.

Sue de Nim

It’s “unhinged” to remark upon perverse incentives? Do you think lobbyists for any other industry are purely motivated by what’s objectively good public policy and never twist facts to support their corporate interests? If not, why would you think gun industry lobbyists would be any different?

GAU-8

The gun manufacturers have no such interest. There are 80,000,000-100,000,000 legal gun owners, there are an equal or greater amount of potentially lawful owners yet unserved. In pure economics, the greatest market is generated by eliminating the criminal use and increasing firearm acceptance and recreational use.

The greatest short term boon for business has been the anti-gun crowd in Washington with each tragedy they exploit to further their agenda the people voice their disapproval with their wallets.

What laws easements has the gun rights lobby pushed? None.

But I get it, by not wishing to implement additional ineffective laws you think that makes it easier. How?

You keep getting pressed for specifics but continue to reply with generalities. I too would like to hear specifics.

I have one easy specific to start you off. 25% of murderers have 10 or more felonies. Three strikes should really be three strikes – life in prison without parole.

Sue de Nim

The #1 reason people by handguns is for self-defense, is it not? The greater the danger of violent crime, the more people want to defend themselves, no? Seems pretty obvious to me that violent crime is good for the gun business.

GAU-8

Still have no such interest. Now you are spouting left wing fantasy.

Sue de Nim

I think you’re in denial about that.

GAU-8

You have offered zero evidence.

Will

That’s because that’s exactly what has happened. Look at the UK, NYC, Australia, etc.

Sue de Nim

Confiscation and tyranny is not what happened in those places by any stretch of the imagination.

Will

All those places have confiscation and a disregard for civil rights. Look at Stop and Frisk or Europe’s “hate speech” laws.

Sue de Nim

In all those places, law abiding citizens are allowed to have guns. And while NY’s stop-and-frisk policy or European hate speech laws are not things I approve of, neither do they amount to tyranny under any normal definition of the word. The categorical objection to any restriction on guns based on the argument that it would inevitably lead to confiscation and tyranny is nothing but fear mongering.

Will

That’s a joke right? A few politically connected people are allowed a limited variety of guns under ultra-strict conditions.
Hate speech laws violate civil rights just like gun laws.

Sue de Nim

You’re buying into the NRA’s propaganda, and your mention of European hate speech laws is a red herring.

Will

Civil rights are civil rights. Gun rights are every bit the equal of free speech.

GAU-8

A violation of the 4th Amendment isn’t tyrannical?

Sue de Nim

I don’t approve of stop-and-frisk, but as tyrannical things go, it’s trivial. To describe NYC as being in a state of tyranny because of stop-and-frisk is a vast overstatement, along the lines of calling a hangnail a serious medical condition. It trivializes real tyranny, like what existed in Nazi Germany or the Soviet Union or Maoist China.

GAU-8

You know libertarians believe in Government right? Just we believe in limited Government design to protect our right to life, liberty, happiness, the ownership of property and our civil liberties.

GAU-8

I have never needed a gun.
I will most likely never need a gun,
But if I ever need a gun I’d better have a gun…so I have a gun
The moment the Government says I can’t have a gun, that’s when I need a gun

williamdiamon

Excellent words of wisdom GAU-8, none more true.

prairiedog

There are many examples of guns made to look like ordinary things that date back over 150 years and probably older: http://bit.ly/1V2QZ6b

kevins

The guy is self-conscious about his weapon, so he wants to conceal it. Hummm…there is an alternative to that dilemma.

John Dilligaf

I’ll bet we can come up with more than one alternative. Here’s one: Educate the people who have an irrational fear of firearms by teaching their children basic firearms safety in school.

Sue de Nim

In other words, normalize guns. In other other words, normalize the idea of using or threatening deadly violence in daily life.

Mitch Berg

Daily life? Where on *earth* do you get that?

The laws makes it pretty clear that deadly force is the *last resort*. And it should be.

Implicit in carrying a gun is a prior decision that you might use it as some hypothetical “last resort.” Using a gun means using deadly violence. Brandishing a gun means threatening deadly violence. Carrying a gun means being prepared use or threaten deadly violence. Normalizing the carrying of guns in daily life means normalizing the use or threat of deadly violence in daily life. What’s not to get?

Mitch Berg

OK. So?

And why the scare quotes around “last resort?” You clearly don’t know the law regarding self-defense; that’s exactly what it is.

Sue de Nim

You don’t like my point, so you criticize the way I make it.

Mitch Berg

Whether I like your point or not is irrelevant. You’re implying that the last resort, isn’t a last resort.

Or do I have that wrong?

Given your rather inflammatory language about “gun nuts” elsewhere in this and other threads, it doesn’t seem like a big stretch.

Sue de Nim

The necessity to use deadly force in self-defense is a lot more rare than gun nuts seem to think or that their rhetoric implies.

Mitch Berg

And it’s getting rarer – thanks, in part, to the drop in violent crime that tends to go along with shall-issue carry laws.

You can choose to be any kind of person you want, and hold onto any superstitions you want about others’ motivations. That’s all they are, but it’s a free country, more or less.

And there you go – “gun nuts” again. Charming, I tell ya.

Sue de Nim

Again, correlation, not causation. Violent crime started dropping before the fad of shall-issue carry laws. Those laws exist only because a certain group of politicians saw it as a wedge issue they could use to pander to their base.

Mitch Berg

Well, no.

In 1983, there were 8 “shall issue” states. By the early nineties – when crime peaked – it had risen into the twenties.

It’s fair to say that the drop in crime started *after* the “fad” started, and accelerated as “shall issue” picked up steam.

Of course it’s correlation. It’s a pretty strong correlation. Feel free to provide a factual rebuttal. I’ll take it apart, but give it a shot anyway, k?

Sue de Nim

Earlier you cited Minnesota as an example. Minnesota didn’t fall in line with that fad until quite late in the game, long after the downward trend of violence was well under way.

Mitch Berg

Again, untrue.

Minnesota homicides peaked at 155 in 1993. In 2003, when Shall Issue was introduced, there were 127. That was a 19.4% drop.

So as you see, the rate of decline *accelerated* after Shall Issue was passed.

When we got into “the game” is irrelevant, really – but it supports my case anyway.

Sue de Nim

There is no evidence that the acceleration of that decline is due to the “shall issue.” I think it’s due to people generally growing to abhor violence more than they did in previous generations, as evidenced by the growing concern about such things as bullying.

Mitch Berg

Well, yes – there is evidence; the correlation I’ve spelled out.

I keep giving you evidence, facts, laws, history, numbers.

You keep giving me “I think” and “I feel” – thoughts and feelings that the facts and actual evidence show to be (I’ll be charitable) mistaken.

I think we’re done here.

Sue de Nim

Actually, nowhere did I say “I feel.” And when I say “I think,” it’s because there’s some logic behind it, as in, “I think [the decline in violence is] due to people generally growing to abhor violence more than they did in previous generations, as evidenced by the growing concern about such things as bullying.” You have only cited a correlation between “shall issue” laws and a decrease in violence; you have not proved causation. At most, you’ve show that “shall carry” laws don’t do any quantifiable harm. My argument is that gun culture, to the extent that it normalizes violence as an option, even if rare, is harmful to humanity in ways that aren’t necessarily quantifiable in terms of crime statistics. It matters less to me whether guns are legal than whether the obsession with them is socially acceptable.

Mitch Berg

“My argument is that gun culture, to the extent that it normalizes violence as an option, even if rare, is harmful to humanity in ways that aren’t necessarily quantifiable in terms of crime statistics.”

And I’d argue that mankind reacting to threats from a position of learned, enforced helplessness is much, much more harmful to humanity; it turns us all into battered spouses with no chance of salvation.

Some folks seem OK with that.

” It matters less to me whether guns are legal than whether the obsession with them is socially acceptable.”

You say “obsession”. The only “obsession” seems to be your need to ridicule those you disagree with.

Sue de Nim

You committed the fallacy of the false dilemma when you implied that the alternative to your point of view amounts to “reacting to threats from a position of learned, enforced helplessness”.

Mitch Berg

It’s not a false dilemma at all, if you really know the issue (and, with no disrespect intended, you clearly don’t, outside of time-worn superstitions about gun owners).

All of the paths on this issue lead, logically and inexorably, toward one of two endpoints:

A) The law-abiding citizen is free and empowered to *effectively* defend their life, family, property and civilization. AKA “A society of free people”, including using (as a last resort) the most effective means to that end there is.

B) The law-abiding citizen is forbidden to defend themselves (effectively) from disorder, and in some cases actively persecuted for trying, as in the UK today. AKA “Serfdom and servility”.

Is there middle ground? Sure – but the left is trying actively to pull us toward “B”, whether they admit, or know, it or not.

I’ll stick with “A”, thanks.

Sue de Nim

It absolutely is a false dilemma. Furthermore, your insistence that any compromise on “A” would lead inexorably to “B” is an example of the slippery slope fallacy.

Will

” It matters less to me whether free speech or due process are legal than whether the obsession with them is socially acceptable.”

Sue de Nim

I know of no one who is obsessed with free speech or due process the way some folks I know personally are obsessed with guns.

Will

That’s because you don’t have major political and media figures demanding either be destroyed.

Sue de Nim

Yes, that explains why some folks are obsessed with gun rights, but I was referring to people I know who are obsessed with guns.

Will

Guns and gun rights are the same thing. You might as well claim people against book banning are “obsessed with books” and not free speech.

Sue de Nim

Yeah, nuance is pointless with ideologues like you.

Will

Civil rights have no nuance. They are rights. It’s that simple.

Sue de Nim

Again, this particular point is not about civil rights. I know people who are obsessed with cars, even though no one seems to be worried about car rights being taken away. I think being obsessed with cars is foolish, but it doesn’t worry me. The people I know who are obsessed with guns do.

Will

And what constitutes “obsessed?” People have interests. That shouldn’t worry you at all. Especially not an interest in a basic civil right.

Sparafucile

Your “thinking” is supported by no fact — yet you want to impose your thinking upon everybody, as you suggest. Why are you such a totalitarian?

Sue de Nim

What ever gave you the idea that I “want to impose” my thinking on anyone? Think whatever ridiculous thing you want. If anyone’s imposing, it’s the NRA and their ilk imposing their gun ideology on American politics.

Sparafucile

What gave me that idea? Everything you’ve written.

Sue de Nim

Don’t read very carefully, do you? And when you do, you read into it whatever you damn well please, apparently.

Sparafucile

Noted — that you’ve done nothing to state that this is NOT your thinking. Seems I was right about your totalitarian instincts, and can further surmise that you don’t know how to escape the hole you’ve dug.

Sue de Nim

I see. You need an explicit denial — not clever enough to get what I was quite clearly implying. Okay, fine.

THAT IS NOT MY THINKING.

Happy now?

Sparafucile

Ok, so you dissemble too.

Sue de Nim

No, that would be you.

Sparafucile

IKYABWAI – the indelible mark of a troll.

Bye troll.

Sue de Nim

As I said, that would be you.

Will

So what if it is? Either correlation or causation debunk claims guns are dangerous or a problem.

kevins

Sue wisely and appropriately mentioned the distinction between correlation and causation. People commonly make this mistake in logic and it is often difficult to accept. Sort of like Obama and gas prices.

Mitch Berg

“Sue wisely and appropriately mentioned the distinction between correlation and causation”

Right. And I noted simultaneously that I provided correlation (while noting that correlation is neither causation nor meaningless), and that Sue provided neither. Just opinion unsupported by the faintest smidgen of evidence.

kevins

To your credit, you used the word “support” rather than “prove”..if only most others understood the difference.

Mitch Berg

And last year, as Minnesota topped 200,000 permittees, homicides dropped below 2/100,000 for the first time since, IIRC, the ’50s (when Minnesotans didn’t need a permit at all to carry a gun – a requirement that started in 1974).

Seems that trend can be almost entirely explained by factors other than “shall issue” laws.

Mitch Berg

There are a zillion correlations. No single factor explains it.

The WaPo has a long history of unhinged hostility to private gun ownership.

Ruckabumpkus

Yes, and that WaPo article pointed to five separate things that are correlated with it. Another one I’ve heard mentioned (and this one troubles me, because I’m uneasy about abortion) is that Roe v. Wade led to fewer unwanted children, which meant fewer troubled kids entering their crime-prone years about that time. And then there’s Stephen Pinker’s thesis that per-capita violence has been declining in fits and starts for basically all of human history.

Mitch Berg

There are so many gaps in the WaPo’s logic, to say nothing of the “Abortion” theory. You’d think the crime rate would drop more in places where the abortion rate was highest – but it didn’t.

The correlations in the other five WaPo theories break down when you get into specifics as well.

Which ones? I have to head out, but I’ll try to go through and ifnd them later.

J F Hanson

That “last resort” is in fact there for all of us.

But some don’t get that.

Sparafucile

It seems that you don’t understand the difference between peace and violence.

Sue de Nim

Enlighten me then. I was under the impression that peace is more than just the absence of violence– that peace enforced at gunpoint is no peace at all. Am I wrong about that, in your opinion?

Mitch Berg

“peace enforced at gunpoint is no peace at all.”

Another false premise.

Peace “enforced at gunpoint” – deterrence – is peace. Or at least sometimes the best one can hope for.

Sue de Nim

No, deterring violence is not the same as making peace.

Mitch Berg

Perhaps. But it’s a start.

There is no true peace without strength.

Sue de Nim

But only a start.

Sparafucile

No thanks. I don’t conduct remedial education for people whose opinions have outstripped their intellect.

Will

Kids have been taught gone safety for centuries. It’s perfectly normal. My mother and aunts were shooting at 8.

Ruckabumpkus

The guy was embarrassed that a 7 year old noticed he was carrying a gun, and you think that’s a bad thing? Here’s what I think is remarkable: people are more bothered by children being exposed to sex than them being exposed to guns and the violence guns represent. I could get into big trouble if I make a sexually suggestive gesture toward a kid (and rightly so), but if I make a gesture like I’m shooting a kid with my finger, nobody cares. When it’s more okay to depict acts of hatred and violence in the movies and on TV than to too explicitly show people making LOVE, there’s something wrong with this picture. Sex and violence are both adult subject matter, not for kids.

Gary F

So a law is going to stop someone? Sure it might stop the mass producing of them in the USA, but that doesn’t mean people are not going to get them. Remember people, laws only work for the people that want to obey them.

kevins

Interesting Gary, but the fact that citizens ignore or evade laws is true for more than just firearms. Would legal gun carriers support legalizing pot?

Gary F

I have mixed feelings on this. By legalizing pot, we’d get more pot smoking.

1. We have a type 2 diabetes problem in this country already.
2. We have finally got most of society to acknowledge that drinking and driving is bad, now we have stoned drivers
3. We currently have the highest percentage of able bodied people not looking for work. Think that will go down with pot smoking?
4. Colorado is finding out that the illegal drug market for pot is still huge because taxed pot costs to much.

The libertarian in me says legalize it, the productive tax payer says I’m tired of paying for all the fat stoners who will need more of my tax money.

Sparafucile

But the rampant and violent criminality that defined the trade of an illicit substance didn’t bother you?

Mitch Berg

Sure. Legalize pot. Go for it.

Question: Do you see a pattern of *law-abiding citizens* ignoring gun laws, and then committing crimes?

Please be specific.

kevins

Always fun to see your posts Mitch. Seems to me however that “law-abiding citizens” and “then committing crimes” doesn’t work well together, so I don’t know about any patterns that you speak of. Do you know of any patterns of pot causing people to become dead? How about “law-abiding citizens” and cheat on your taxes, drive faster than the legal speed limit, and/or consume pot? Now those seem to co-occur frequently (and BTW, I do own guns, don’t consume pot, try to drive the speed limit, and my tax accountant alleges that I follow all the rules). As for the gun, it is cute. Maybe people would but it for that.

Mitch Berg

If I understand your point – and I hope i do…

I think we agree – ? – but there IS no pattern of law-abiding citizens causing problems with guns.

And I know of only two patterns of people dying in relation to chiba:
1. Gang turf wars (which is why I favor legalization)
2. People like me shooting themselves after listening to Dave Matthews and Phish.

Law-abiding people may break the speed limit and cut corners on taxes, but those are victimless “crimes”. Mischief with guns, not so much.

kevins

I agree about the mischief!

Ruckabumpkus

To assert that “there IS no patter of law-abiding citizens causing problems with guns” is a tautology. Causing problems with guns is by definition a violation of the law, so your comment is vacuously true and says nothing about what public policy should be.

Mitch Berg

Ruck,

That’s both superficially true and an evasion.

Over 70% of gun homicides involve shooters with criminal records. Many of the rest are young people who had juvenile crime records.

Let’s go for hard numbers. Look at carry permittees, all of whom pass state background checks proving they are demonstrably law-abiding. How many *unjustified* homicides have they committed in Minnesota in the past 13 years?

One (and it was woman who may have been ineligible, but got favorable treatment from a relative on the police force).

That’s a homicide rate about 1/2 of 1% of the general population.

I think we can both agree that THAT says something about what public policy should be, right?

J F Hanson

Psst! do your math again, Mitch–the rate is a lot lower than what you say.

Mitch Berg

Actually, I was conservative.

In Milwaukee – one of the better surveys done, so far – 91% of murder victims have a criminal record:

There will be no point to passing a law against guns that look like cell phones. The market will erase this particular idea in no time at all; it’s just plain silly.

If, heaven forefend, you need it, it’ll take more fidding around to get it into action than a conventional concealed pistol – and all for what, two shots (of, from the looks of it, a barely-capable caliber)?

If I DID carry a firearm (and I don’t, because guns are scary; Heather Martens says so, and she’s a beacon of truth), this would be near the bottom of the list of things I’d choose.

jim

i do carry and i sure wouldn’t trade in my ppk for this little pea-shooter. as a gun nut i can admire the creativity of the gunsmith here but if this gun does go into production it will not sell well. at best it will wind up as a curiosity / collector piece. it seems to me that the “question of the day” was only meant to stir the passions of those with an irrational fear of guns and contempt of lawful gun owners.

LilAsil

So instead of reflecting on his experience, this guy decides I know, I’ll make my gun look like something else because I love my gun….as long as it looks like my phone and not actually my gun. Sounds like a person I’d rather not have armed with a gun….no matter what it looks like.

Sparafucile

Wow … that twas nonsensical.

Linda

I don’t see a need for guns concealed as cell phones. Heck, I just learned how to use the flashlight on my cell phone.

Ruckabumpkus

Wow! This is so predictable. Whenever the TQ is remotely related to guns, there are a few posts by regulars right away, and then about a day later a bunch of pro-gun activists jump in and take over the discussion. I guess, if the folks at MPR want to drive up the comment count here, all they have to do is mention guns.

Mitch Berg

Well, it IS an area where we pretty much have an absolute monopoly on evidence and fact.

Ruckabumpkus

Then why the arrogant tone, and why the obsession with proving your point? In earlier posts on this page, you indicated you were “done,” only to jump in again. You seem deathly afraid that someone might persist in disagreeing with you. It’s remarkable how similar these gun rights discussions feel to debates I used to have with creationists, whose zealotry seems to come from a deep-seated fear that what they desperately want to believe might not be true.

J F Hanson

…projection, projection….

kevins

regression…regression…

J F Hanson

No, regression is not the applicable psych term for the description you used, kevins.

kevins

It suits an out of context two word utterance coming from an adult who’s mandala is a pistol, J F Hanson.

J F Hanson

ahh, but it is not a mandala, Kevin–that is what is a good example of projection.

It is merely a picture of one of my carry guns. I use it to distract projectionists.

kevins

Wow, being a projectionist would be neat, but it’s a dying profession these days.

J F Hanson

Not if you are in the correct union, Kevins.

Mitch Berg

Arrogant. Projection. Creationists. Obsession. Regression.

So much name-calling.

So much of MPR’s audience is so sodden with Urban Liberal Privilege, they just HAVE to believe that any dissent is some sort of pathology.

Not sure what my motivations have to do with anything, other than more ad-homina fodder.

“You seem deathly afraid…”

Why do you people always assume “Fear” is ever a factor?

Sue de Nim

Re: name-calling, a right guaranteed under the 1st Amendment.

You have a right under the 2nd Amendment to carry a gun. I have a right under the 1st Amendment to express the opinion that carrying one for no good reason makes you a jerk. (So does using one as your avatar image.) If you’re not hunting or shooting for sport, the only reason for carrying a gun is to have a handy way to kill or intimidate people. Insisting on doing that when there’s little or no risk of encountering actually dangerous people is either anti-social or paranoid.

Look, it’s clear that the pro-gun advocates have won the political battle, and there’s no chance of getting reasonable gun safety laws through Congress any time soon. The only recourse left to those of us who think there are too many guns out there is social opprobrium. I intend to use that weapon.

J F Hanson

Yes!!
The intolerance of the antigun crowd is once more displayed.

Sue de Nim

I’m not “antigun.” What I’m opposed to is the ideology of 2nd Amendment fundamentalists, the subculture that fetishizes guns, and jerks who are in-your-face about exercising their gun rights just because they can. Clearly you chose a gun as your avatar image to be provocative. Congratulations. I’m provoked. Don’t feign surprise about that. I have no duty to be “tolerant” of your choice to depict a tool that exists for the sole purpose of providing a handy way to kill people.

J F Hanson

Clearly you chose to consider my avatar provocative because you hadn’t seen it before and because of what it symbolizes to you.

Again, that is projection.

I’ve used it for years, in many contexts, and in many, many Disqus commentaries. And, were you to meet me, Sue (and you might; we have friends in common). you would probably be hard-pressed to call me “in your face.”

Sue de Nim

Actually, I noticed your avatar image quite a while ago. And you as much as admitted in an earlier post that you chose it to annoy people who object to the symbolism. I assure you, it has achieved that purpose. If annoying people is what you really want to do, that’s your choice.

Will

And “good reason” is what exactly?

Ruckabumpkus

There’s also the Lysistrata Strategy to consider. Imagine if women all over the country were to tell all the men in their lives that guns are not sexy…. It would put the gun industry out of business.

Ruckabumpkus

Isn’t it obvious that fear is a major factor? If you’re not afraid, why would you think you need to carry a gun?

J F Hanson

Because it is a tool that I am very skilled in using and because I consider it good insurance for dealing with the unexpected threat.

Ruckabumpkus

Like I said, you’re afraid that you might face an “unexpected threat” that a gun might help you “deal” with.

J F Hanson

But why do you assume that the response to a threat is fear?

Do we assume Boy Scouts, back in the day, were fearful because they were prepared?

Your model of human behavior is limited by your politics, I think, and not by reality.

Ruckabumpkus

If there were no fear involved, you wouldn’t be referring to it as a “threat”– unless you don’t mean “fear” in the normal sense of the English word.

John Dilligaf

1. a statement of an intention to inflict pain, injury, damage, or other hostile action on someone in retribution for something done or not done.

“members of her family have received death threats”

synonyms: threatening remark, warning, ultimatum

“Maggie ignored his threats”

2. a person or thing likely to cause damage or danger.

“hurricane damage poses a major threat to many coastal communities”

Nowhere does that imply that fear is required. Meeting a threat with equal or greater force to stop the threat may or may not involve fear, but it is not required for the threat to be real.

? OHJonesy

I keep a fire extinguisher on every floor of my house. Does that mean I am afraid of fire? Of course not, but sometimes bad things happen to good people, and only fools are unprepared,

No one believes that you should have a gun, that’s a personal choice only you can make, but we strongly believe that it’s our constitutionally protected right to keep and bear arms, if we so choose.

The problem is that most people don’t understand guns. You should be qualified to own a gun. The first qualification is that you must be willing to kill someone. If you are not willing to kill someone, you should never go near a gun. They will get you in trouble. They are not a toy. You should carry it around until it is part of you. You should practice the motions until they are driven by the sub conscious. If you have to think, your dead.

? OHJonesy

I agree, many people do not understand guns, and they’re the ones who want to take them away from those of us law-abiding citizens that DO understand them. But to tell me that I can’t own a gun unless I am willing to kill someone ignores several facts. First, most people who use a gun in self defense never fire a shot. Criminals usually turn and run when their victim presents a gun. Second, not everyone owns a gun for self defense, many use them for competition or target shooting.

None the less, you’re quite right that anyone who carries a gun but is not very well versed with it, is perhaps under the illusion that they’re prepared. There’s much more than packing heat to self defense. Staying aware of your surroundings (situational awareness) is critical, avoiding situations or places where trouble may lurk is important. You make a good point tho, one that I generally agree with. Self defense is a mind-set, the gun is just a tool.

Dick Bresee

You show a gun and you just put a target on your back for EVERYONE to shoot at..

? OHJonesy

Who is this “everyone”? I’m pretty sure most criminals don’t commit their crimes in the middle of the mall during Christmas season.

Chances are, most self defense situations are going to take place when you are alone – it will be you, maybe someone you’re with, and one or more attackers. Pulling a gun may not be the best choice, and my first instinct will probably be to reach for my wallet, or turn and run if I can.

But what if your attacker(s) want more than your wallet? The one self defense tactic I will never employ is the “Do what you want to the girl, but don’t hurt me.” And a gun in my waistband may be the difference.

I don’t carry because I am looking for trouble. I carry a gun because no matter how hard I try, trouble may come looking for me..

Dick Bresee

I was speaking of self defense, not rabbit hunting.

? OHJonesy

Yes, so was I. Hence my comment, “Self defense is a mind-set, the gun is just a tool.”

Since you know absolutely nothing about music, I would think that you
would want to learn a thing or two before making an ass of yourself.
Yes, a classical pianist does not need to be original. We are
interpretive artists, and do not compose music. Original thinking is
not part of our thinking process, and pianists who come up with
“original” interpretations are often laughed off the stage. The point
is to get as close to what the COMPOSER wants, not our own originality.
I suggest you stick to a topic you know something about next time.

Sue de Nim

Thanks for your honesty about the fact that carrying a gun entails being willing to kill someone. I tried to make a similar point earlier and was not taken seriously by folks on the pro-gun side. There certainly isn’t any prejudice involved in that, is there? No, of course not.

Dick Bresee

If I see you out on the street with a gun, are you going to kill me? Not if I’m a good enough shot.

Dick Bresee

Why would you want a gun on the street unless you were willing to kill some one. If you pull it out and wave it around your dead.

Dick Bresee

The only person that I and many others is afraid of is the prosecuting Attorney. One day he will go By By and all hell will break out. I’m not afraid of the idiot muggers but I want a gun to take care of them if they show up.

whitedoggie44

This is an issue where I really split with my republican friends. Dislike guns and if they were banned tomorrow, we would be a better country. I , as an expat, have lived in 6 foreign countries during my career and except for dealing with the occasion drunken hooligan in other countries, the U.S. is the only country where I ever had a gun pointed at my head in exchange for my wallet. Guns that look like cell phone cases is just nuts.

Sparafucile

It’s odd that you don’t understand that drunken hooligan is similarly well-equipped to kill a smaller person as is a mugger with a gun that he doesn’t intend to use.

Will

You were likely robbed in a city where guns are illegal by a felon legally bared from owning guns. Banning guns is as useless as banning drugs.

lindblomeagles

NPR, I can’t provide a logical, unbiased thought about this question. By far, the victims of gun violence are low or no income earning males of color under the age of 30 and women of similar age and economics. Therefore, it is my presumption that supporters of conceal and carry generally aren’t going to be victims of gun violence, and therefore, should not have the right to conceal and carry. Conceal and carry enthusiasts, from a distance to me, are either hyper-sensitive to people of color or just love guns and the power they believe guns personally bestow on the carrier. In my view, conceal and carry creates more individuals who predictably will kill more young men and women of color. A gun resembling a cell phone adds to the murder count, in my opinion.

Ruckabumpkus

I’m not convinced that having more rich white people being armed will necessarily lead to more violence against the poor and people of color, but you’re onto something with your observation about those folks being disproportionately the victims. Guns are not cheap, so it’s mostly rich folks and criminals who choose to have them. If pro-gun zealots were sincere in there belief that having more people be armed would make the world better (not just give themselves a sense of security), they’d be arguing for subsidized guns and free training and ammo for the poor. The fact that they’re not doing that says to me that their zealotry is not about mere facts but also about racial and class prejudice.

Sue de Nim

But what about George Zimmerman? If he didn’t have a gun that day, he wouldn’t have gone looking for trouble the way he did, and Trayvon Martin would still be alive.

J F Hanson

For your contention to be accurate, you have to start with the truth, Sue–and that is that Trayvon doubled back and looked for trouble.

That is all in the trial transcript, BTW.

Sue de Nim

Zimmerman was a self-appointed vigilante, and Martin was a victim of racial profiling. Were it not for his gun and Florida’s “stand your ground” law, Zimmerman would have been appropriately cautious about approaching a “suspicious” individual instead of provoking him. Martin was unarmed and minding his own business, and Zimmerman apparently had an itchy trigger finger. Under the law, Zimmerman’s actions may have been technically justified, but they were clearly unnecessary.

J F Hanson

Your response is simply mischaracterization of the facts of the case–and since this discussion is a diversion, I’ll stop there.

Mitch Berg

“Zimmerman was acting as a self-appointed vigilante”

Media wive’s tale.

What’ JF Hanson said.

Ruckabumpkus

Bovine feces!

Mitch Berg

“Bovine feces!”

Nothing like engaging a true Socratic debater.

Nope, he wasn’t acting like a vigilante. That was an anti-gun chanting point.

To not have his affirmative defense claim of self-defense beaten in court, Zimmerman have to show he was an *unwilling participant* in the incident. Had the prosecution been able to convince a jury he was a willing participant – the belligerent – he’d have lost his affirmative defense, and been convicted.

Eventually, some of you folks start to realize that everything the left and media tells you about guns is wrong. That’s why I do what I do.

Ruckabumpkus

What the law is and what the law should be are two different things. Zimmerman was acquitted only because of Florida’s stand-your-ground law, which allowed him far more leeway to plead “self defense” than it (in my opinion) should have. His acquittal does not mean he was innocent or that Martin’s death was morally justified.

Mitch Berg

Sorry, Ruck – that’s another wive’s tale.

The defense never introduced “Stand your Ground” at trial. It had NOTHING to do with the acquittal! It was a complete non-factor.

Pretty much everything the media and left (ptr) have told you about the Zimmerman case is wrong.

And I”m going to say with confidence you can’t even tell me what the legal or practical meaning of “Stand your Ground” laws actually are.

Ruckabumpkus

The fact that it was not introduced does not mean it was not a factor. It influenced what the prosecution could claim. And even if you’re right, it’s still the case that were it not for Zimmerman having a gun on him, the entire incident probably would not have taken place. He would have stayed in his car and let the police handle it, like the 911 dispatcher asked him to, and like neighborhood watch volunteers are taught. (And Zimmerman’s subsequent well-documented behavior calls into question his veracity about that incident as well.)

J F Hanson

He is right. SYG was not introduced–and, BTW, it is a hearing prior to trial, not part of the trial and charges that may be subsequent.

The balance of your observation is speculation and meets the criteria for personal opinion and nothing more.

As for his veracity WRT Trayvoon and this incident, you are aware that he described in detail the incident and passed a lie-detector test, aren’t you?

AFAIK, the only veracity in question during the trial was the girlfriend’s when she had to admit she couldn’t read.

Ruckabumpkus

It’s more than mere speculation. George Zimmerman is hardly a sympathetic poster child for expanded gun rights. There is no credible evidence that Trayvon Martin was up to no good that day, or that Zimmerman’s intervention prevented a crime that otherwise would have been committed, much less one deserving of the death penalty. Zimmerman’s possession of a gun that day in 2012 clearly did not make the situation better.

J F Hanson

The gyrations you make to justify an opinion that a person who protected himself legally with a firearm are unneeded.

If you are a pacifist, then I admire your tenacity of belief in the face of actual reality. But to claim that a gun “did not make the situation better” for the man whose head was being beaten into the concrete clearly is rationalization that stupifies.

I am done.We’re off topic. If you want bewail the antigun hysteria WRT Zimmerman, then find a discussion of it where it is still the subject of discussion. After. a. trial. In Which The. Charge. of. Not. Guilty Was Determined.

Ruckabumpkus

First, I object to your move of trying to make a point in the discussion and then declaring yourself to be “done.” It says you’re not open to rebuttal. Nonetheless, I can’t force you consider anything I might have to say.

I’m no pacifist. I recognize the right of self-defense. I accept that the jury acquitted Zimmerman, but that’s not the same as proving he was innocent. I do not accept that it was necessary for Trayvon Martin to die. I don’t know why Martin was provoked to attack Zimmerman, if indeed that’s what happened, but it’s hard to believe, given the evidence, that Martin was on the prowl for a victim and Zimmerman just happened to be it. Zimmerman put himself in harm’s way, and his gun is what gave him the nerve to do it. I consider it beyond likely that if he did not have the gun, the entire incident would never have made the news. George Zimmerman is no hero.

cargosquid

Actually, it did.

It saved his life during a felonious assault and battery

Ruckabumpkus

Word about this topic must be getting out on the gun zealot web sites, so more of them are jumping in, saying the same things. It’s getting tiresome.

cargosquid

Nope…just following the Disqus threads and the people I follow.
Its tiresome to you because you are being proven wrong.

Christopher Armour

It’s tiresome because we took away your echo chamber.

Ruckabumpkus

Not at all. You’re lobbing rhetoric bombs from inside your own echo chamber.

Christopher Armour

Need a tissue?

Ruckabumpkus

If you can show that Martin chose Zimmerman as a victim of his criminal intent, rather than minding his own business and being provoked by Zimmerman confronting him, I will agree with you. Since the evidence supports the latter more than the former, I stand by my assertion that the gun did not make anything better, but only worse.

cargosquid

The prosecution showed that Martin was 400 feet away while Martin stayed on the sidewalk, talking to the cops. Rachael Jeantel testified to that. Then she testified that Martin was angry that Zimmerman had followed him in his vehicle. He was next to his father’s apartment and had a working phone. He neither went home nor called the police because he was afraid.
He returned 400 feet to Zimmerman’s location. Thus…. he confronted Zimmerman. Forensics could find no signs of defensive wounds on Martin….showing that he was the only one to have actually thrown a punch. Martin was witnessed committing felony assault and battery on Zimmerman, who had obeyed dispatch and not followed Martin, having lost him in the dark. Zimmerman’s firearm allowed him to protect himself against a felony assault.

Ruckabumpkus

Again, the fact that he was acquitted does not mean that he was innocent, and even if what he did was technically legal, that doesn’t mean it was morally justified. Clearly, Martin was provoked, probably unnecessarily. Martin is entirely to blame for assaulting Zimmerman, if that’s what he did, but would Zimmerman have done whatever he did to provoke Martin if he didn’t have the gun? Probably he would have been more cautious about approaching or following a “suspicious” individual were it not for perceived security provided by the gun. So, the presence of the gun made it easier to decide not to deescalate and more likely that violence would occur. In other words, the gun most likely made things worse. If Zimmerman had passed by that spot five minutes later and not seen Martin at all, probably nothing bad would have happened that day in that place.

Christopher Armour

I don’t think Zimmerman provoked Martin, but let’s say he did. Lets say Zimmerman got within a couple feet of Martin and started yelling racial epithets. Does that make it legal for Martin to assault Zimmerman? No it doesn’t, as you stated directly after victim blaming Zimmerman for provoking Martin. Martin was a hot-head and that’s what got him killed. It wasn’t the guns fault for emboldening Zimmerman, it wasn’t Zimmerman’s fault for provoking Martin, those are ridiculous arguments. Martin had zero right to assault anyone regardless of their actions.

J F Hanson

Please. Quit fooling yourself with speculative fairy tales that support your hopolophobia. They add nothing of substance to a discussion of facts.

Ruckabumpkus

Ooh, I had to look that one up. You must be really smart to use big words like that. Except you misspelled it. It’s “hoplophobia” (which Disqus’s spell-checker doesn’t recognize, btw). It’s a neologism coined for political purposes to disparage gun control advocates. In the words of it’s coiner, Jeff Cooper, “I coined the term ‘hoplophobia’ in 1962 in response to a perceived need for a word to describe a mental aberration consisting of an unreasoning terror of gadgetry, specifically, weapons.” The fact that you think that describes me says a lot about you.

cargosquid

So…getting your head beaten into concrete by someone that has attacked you is not moral enought for you? Clearly Martin was provoked? You have evidence to that? How was he provoked while talking on the phone 400 FEET away? Zimmerman did not follow him. THAT IS THE POINT. Zimmerman lost sight of him before he left the vehicle and then stopped when asked to by dispatch.
The gun use saved his life.

You can play what if all you like. If Martin had not been suspended from school again for fighting and possessing burglary tools…he would have be home with his mother.

See how that works?

? OHJonesy

Please read this. It was written by a police office who specializes in training police in shooting skills. He’s often called as an expert witness, and has written several articles about the Zimmerman case. This guy knows what he’s talking about:

Okay, I did. To quote from the article (in a publication not known for it’s objectivity on gun issues), “Whether or not it’s smart or tactically sound for the private citizen to follow someone who might be a burglar to report a location to police, it is in no way against the law.” And that’s my point. It was not smart, and if he didn’t have his gun on him, he wouldn’t have done it, so the gun made things worse.

Christopher Armour

Pure speculation on your part, and irrelevant.

? OHJonesy

I’m not going to pretend that the publication is not pro-gun. My point is, look at the author. He writes for many publications, and he has his own blog. His credentials are impeccable.

And yes, Ayoob agrees that Zimmerman may not have been executing the best judgement in following Martin. I agree with that too. But he in no way broke any laws by doing so.

Martin did, by commencing a physical assault against Zimmerman. The gun was not a part of any of this, up until the point that Martin attacked.

So, how exactly did the gun make things worse for anyone except the attacker? Would you have been happier if Zimmerman was found dead with his brains leaking all over that sidewalk?

Zimmerman did not make the best choices that night, but can you really say if he didn’t have his gun on him, he wouldn’t have followed Martin? You don’t know that, it’s pure conjecture on your part.

There’s only one thing we know – Martin almost certainly initiated the attack, and he would have almost certainly killed of severely hurt Zimmerman. The gun made things better for the law-abiding citizen that night. It probably saved his life.

Ruckabumpkus

And you don’t know that Zimmerman would have gotten out of his vehicle if he didn’t have his gun. Given what I know of human nature, I think it’s more than likely that the would not have and that the encounter would not have happened.

? OHJonesy

Again, you’re guessing. It’s conjecture. We simply do not know, but it really doesn’t matter.

What matters is this: Zimmerman was completely within his rights to do what he did. Martin was completely within his rights to ignore Zimmerman, or even to turn around and say “Why are you following me?”.

Martin had no right to attack Zimmerman. Once he did, Zimmerman had the right to use deadly force to protect his life.

Whether you think you know human nature or not, you cannot predict what all people will do in any such situation. Some people, even unarmed, would certainly have followed Martin too. Some people would have ran home and hid under their beds.

Again, you don’t know. You’re guessing.

Geralt_0f_Rivia

There is no provocation that can justify assaulting another individual except for self-defense, a simple observance of one individual by another does not suffice nor warrant a physical assault, even if accompanied by a challenge or query about intentions.

Long story short, both Martin and Zimmerman had a right to be where they were, and Zimmerman had a right to observe Martin so long as he remained in a public place, and Zimmerman also had a right to question Martin. Martin himself was under no obligation to answer, and actually had equal claim to question Zimmerman in return, or even tell him to F.O. if he felt so inclined, but neither had any right to initiate force against the other, and the first to do so was in violation of the law.

And it’s true, the evidence does indicate that Martin was the first one to initiate violence, and also escalate it from simple assault to attempted murder by forcing Zimmerman into a disadvantaged supine position where his ability to retreat or defend himself without resorting to lethal force was severely compromised. Nevertheless though, had the event transpired exactly the same way only without the presence of the firearm, the end result could possibly (perhaps even probably) have led to Zimmerman’s death, so it’s tough sell to say that the gun did not improve the situation for Zimmerman.

Mitch Berg

“The fact that it was not introduced does not mean it was not a factor.”

Why, yes. It means precisely that. The defense never invoked it, and it’s for darn sure prosecution never did.

“It influenced what the prosecution could claim.”

That is completely untrue.

” it’s still the case that were it not for Zimmerman having a gun on him, the entire incident probably would not have taken place.”

Actually, if Zimmerman had not had a gun, it means he’d have been dead or severely injured. Because that’s one of the standards you have to meet to claim self-defense – a jury believes you’re in *immediate* threat of death or (in FL) severe bodily harm.

“He would have stayed in his car and let the police handle it,”

So now you’re clairvoyant? “

cargosquid

No..it did not influence what the prosecution could claim.

The dispatcher did not tell him to stay in the vehicle and he did not follow Martin who had already disappeared.

He was proven not guilty by the PROSECUTION’S evidence.

cargosquid

Actually, SYG had zero to do with it.
He was acquitted solely on self defense since SYG did NOT apply.

GAU-8

SYG was not invoked. This was a case of self-defense. You can’t
“retreat” if someone is sitting on you assaulting you violently can you?

Ruckabumpkus

And I wonder if you have a similar rebuke for the misogynistic yahoos who’ve been spouting much less mild invective and much more vile insults recently, but in support of your side of the argument. I’d be embarrassed to be associated with jackasses like that. They desperately need someone to tell them to shut up and let the grown-ups talk. They’re hurting your cause, you know.

Mitch Berg

“And I wonder if you have a similar rebuke for the misogynistic yahoos who’ve been spouting much less mild invective and much more vile insults recently”

Yes.

Not sure what a dummy or two on my side has to do with my argument, though.

Ruckabumpkus

Nothing to do with your argument, just that that sort of rhetorical bullying makes the pro-gun crowd seem much less appealing than they might otherwise be. Folks would be a lot less hesitant to embrace your message if it weren’t being sabotaged by that antisocial behavior. Do the grownups in your camp ever try to actively discourage that sort of thing, or doesn’t it bother you much? I mean, they’re not exactly giving the impression that they’re responsible gun owners.

Mitch Berg

GOCRA, GOAL and MN-CCRA – the groups that have led the way on gun rights in Minnesota for the past 25 years – had a policy at their rallies; “no camouflage”. That’s among all the other behavioral expectations they set. They’ve worked; the Capitol Police will tell you if you ask that there is no better-behaved large group at the Capitol than the 2nd Amendment crowd. I’ve been a member of all three groups since about 1992.

Not unsurprisingly, the media plays up the stories about the very, very few badly-behaved gun-rights advocates for political reasons – all the while while ignoring the bad behavior of a whole lot of antis.

And some of the “bad behavior” is just plain fabricated. When Heather Martens says gun owners “intimidate” anti-gunners by bringing guns to the Capitol, that’s just madness; no better than saying black people at the Capitol “intimidate” you.

cargosquid

None of what you just wrote is true.

japete

Is “looking for trouble” as you put it ( which is not a proven thing) enough to be shot to death by someone suspicious of others carrying a gun and looking for someone?

Christopher Armour

I guess Martin shouldn’t of assaulted Zimmerman, he wouldn’t of been shot to death.

japete

Speculation on your part. There is no actual proof of your assertion and never was, according to anything we really know about the case because Trayvon is dead. Was he acting in self defense against Zimmerman? We know, by his actions since his acquittal, that he is not a find upstanding law abiding guy.

Christopher Armour

The only wounds on Martin besides the bullet hole, were on Martin’s knuckles. Martin followed Zimmerman back to his car and assaulted him.

J F Hanson

Read the trial transcript. He told his girlfriend on the phone that he was going to attack Zimmerman. And he did–in fact, beat Zimmerman’s head against the concrete.

This was proven at the trial–as I said, read the transcript.

Barry

No. Defending against felony assault is enough to justify shooting someone. They both had a right to be outside that night. Zimmerman had a right to get out of his car. Zimmerman had the right to be armed. Martin had a right to walk to the store. The evidence shows that the first illegal action of the night was Martin assaulting Zimmerman. Assaulting people is a good way to get killed.

GAU-8

If you attack them and sit on their chest and beat them like a drum like the evidence suggests Trayvon did….then (and the jury agreed)….yes

Barry

“and Trayvon Martin would still be alive.”

That may not be true. His death was a result of a string of very bad decision making on his part. The kind of decision making that causes kids like him to be killed all over the country regardless of carry laws. The only thing unusual about his death was that a person who was legally licensed to carry pulled the trigger. If not for that it wouldn’t have even made the news.

Christopher Armour

Ouch!!! Truth is being slung around this thread and bludgeoning anyone with a false narrative, I like it!!!

And its not the pro-gun guys putting barriers into place against poor people. Get rid of barriers and the cost of owning a gun is much cheaper.

Christopher Armour

Boom!!!

Ruckabumpkus

That’s one group, remarked upon as an oddity three years ago, not part of the mainstream of gun culture.

cargosquid

The mainstream gun culture supports everyone getting armed and trained. We fight against arbitrary, useless laws which purposely infringe on the right to own a gun….for example….every hoop you must jump through in DC.

Ruckabumpkus

So, you’d be in favor of issuing everyone a gun at taxpayer expense and including gun training in the public school curriculum? Or aren’t you really serious about “everyone getting armed and trained”? Because that’s what it would take.

cargosquid

Let them buy their own guns. The right is to keep and bear. It does not need to be given to you.

And yes…. we can put the gun training in the public school system. I’m all for that.
AND for bringing back the citizen militia.

Sue de Nim

If you want me to be armed, you’ll have to give me the gun, and the ammo, and the training, because I’m not going to give one red cent of my own money to the gun industry.

cargosquid

See…that’s what makes this a free country. I want you to have the RIGHT to be armed. Whether you get armed or not is up to you. You are completely free to decide on your own what you want to do. All we ask is to have the same right to be left alone to exercise our rights.

Sue de Nim

But you said you wanted “everyone” to be armed and trained. But I suppose you meant everyone who was willing. But then there’s the question of the poor again. Are you going to subsidize guns for those who can’t afford them? After all, they’re among the most likely to be victims of crime, and you think people who are likely to be victims should be armed. Or is there a class issue in it for you? Is being too poor to afford a gun prima facie evidence that a person is unqualified?

John Dilligaf

Seems like last time we covered this same ground, and someone suggested such a thing, you were afraid what would happen when this poor gun recipient decided they’d rather have food or rent money than the gun. I have no doubt that you’re an intelligent, successful person who is a joy to be around, but you’re wrong on this issue.

(that was meant to be sincere, even though reading it back it sounds like sarcasm. I’ve read your other posts. You care. You try to help/see the other side of an issue, but not on guns – never on guns.)

Sue de Nim

I wouldn’t say I’m afraid of that, but rather concerned about the misplaced priority if someone receives a government issued gun when they’d rather have a bigger rent subsidy or more SNAP benefits. And I suppose the risk would be that such an individual would sell the gun on the black market to someone who shouldn’t have one. But then I assume that a gun issued under such a program would be too cheap, and the market would be too flooded, to be worth selling anyway. You’d probably have to pay to get rid of such a gun under those circumstances. And since so many fine upstanding citizens would be armed (according to the gun crowd’s logic), the risk posed by a black market buyer of such a gun to would be minimal.

But really, this is a reductio ad absurdum argument I’m making. How far is the pro-gun crowd willing to go to be consistent with their ideology that more guns in the hands of more (qualified and trained) people will make the world safer? There is a limit, isn’t there? If you agree that free-guns-and-training-for-the-poor is a ridiculous, unworkable idea, then we’ve agreed on at least one exception to the universal truth of that ideology. We’ve also found an exception to the absolute applicability of the 2nd Amendment: your right to keep and bear arms depends on your ability to afford them. And of course, if the idea of the black market being flooded with cheap guns (even more than it already is) scares you, then I’ve made my case for another limit on the 2nd Amendment.

I’m not anti-gun. I’ve owned hunting weapons in the past, and though I’ve never hunted successfully, I have enjoyed trap shooting and plinking with a .22. What I’m against is radical the 2nd Amendment fundamentalism, which has driven policies that make it much too easy for people who should not have guns to get them. There comes a point where getting more guns into the hands of more people does not make the world better.

As a (non-fundamentalist — have to say that these days to avoid misunderstanding) Christian, I’m also disturbed about the spiritual implications of a gun culture that is often nigh unto idolatrous, as I mentioned elsewhere. But that’s not something that’s a public policy issue. You can’t prohibit people from having ridiculous obsessions, but I reserve my free speech rights to ridicule gun-olatry.

Sue de Nim

Having said all that, on the other hand, I will admit to being anti-handguns, not as a matter of public policy, but personally. Unlike long guns, they exist for the sole purpose of making it easy to kill people, and practicing with them is necessarily practicing to kill people, which I won’t do. If you’re actually afraid of violent crime being committed against you or someone else and carrying one makes you feel safer, I won’t judge you for doing so. But if you tell me you’re not afraid but are carrying one just because you can under the 2nd Amendment, I’ll wonder about your emotional maturity. I won’t stop you, but you can’t require me to approve of it, or to respect you for it, or to be comfortable in your presence, or to refrain from objecting, if that’s what you’re doing. If you consider me to be rude for objecting, well, I consider it to be rude to carry an unnecessary handgun.

GAU-8

Define “too easy” 90% of criminals (FBI survey) get their firearms illegally today. The private purchase, or gun show “loophole” (a private purchase) is a minute source of criminal guns.

Rather than talk generalities be specific

Ruckabumpkus

We tried talking specifics. It didn’t work. By the gun lobby’s logic, there is no constitutional way to make it harder, so we shouldn’t bother trying. Asking for specifics under those conditions is a red herring.

GAU-8

The Universal Background Check? Even Eric Holder said it was worthless….Colorado has had that Mike Bloomberg drive law since for almost 3 years….do you know how many arrests? Zero.

Do you know why? It is impossible to prosecute. The entire law is written with a basic failure to understand the process by which firearms are sold.

Ruckabumpkus

Right. So the gun crowd keeps saying, in effect, even though it’s too easy for people who should not have guns to get them, there’s nothing to be done about it, so we have to live with it. You are being perfectly consistent, and I can’t fault you for that.

GAU-8

My opinion, the attempt to stop “making it too easy” is misplaced. The issue is the criminal. The issue isn’t even cities. Look at Chicago. On the surface it’s homicide rate is 4-5 times the national average…but dive down…that rate is driven by just and handful of neighborhoods, and within those neighborhoods – by just a handful of criminals. A Yale professor has being working with police departments on “social networks” – in Boston for example they discovered 85% of all murders had 6 known criminals in common. Address that. That is far easier to address than pushing this rope of Mike Bloomberg wishes.

Disarming the UK populace didn’t reduce crime….the pro-gun control crowd with point to the low gun-murder rate and cry success, ignoring the total homicide rate increased 50% between 1997 and 2003, and total violent crime rate skyrocketed.

GAU-8

“there is no Constitutional way to make it harder” … not when “harder” means infringing on everybody’s right.

I clearly explained why there were no specifics. If you go read the previous posts in the thread, you’ll see the reasons.

GAU-8

Who is “we” and by didn’t work do you mean “we didn’t get our way?”

Ruckabumpkus

“We” is me and everyone else who’s ever tried to make the case for doing something about the fact that it’s too easy in the USA for people who should not have guns to get them. By “didn’t work,” I mean every suggestion ever made has been shouted down by gun zealots as either something that will be ineffective (because it would only apply to “law-abiding citizens,” while criminals won’t care), or unconstitutional. Even NICS, which the NRA proposed as a ploy to keep 5-day waiting periods from being included in the final Brady Bill, and then tried to get thrown out by the courts, they now consider to be useless, so there’s no point in expanding it to all gun sales. Again, if you read the previous posts, you’ll see all that. That’s why I proposed no new specifics. They’ve all been proposed and rejected, while the gun lobby insists that nothing that’s constitutional will work anyway, so there’s no point in proposing specifics. (Do I sound frustrated? If so, I’ve expressed myself well.)

GAU-8

Again…define “too easy”

By didn’t work…you mean shouted down like universal background checks that are impossible to enforce and prosecute? Even Eric Holder agreed on that. In nearly 3 years Colorado has zero arrests.

What the NRA fought and won was the elimination of language that turned NICS into a registration list

90% of the time criminal obtain their guns illegally. 80% of the time through straw purchases or black market. Both are already Federal crimes, yet rarely pursued. Why is that? There is 80% of the illegal market up for grabs. An opinion might be eliminating those avenues eliminates the argument for more gun laws.

Ruckabumpkus

Look, if you don’t consider it glaringly obvious that it’s too easy in the USA for people who should not have guns to get them, there’s no way I can persuade you of it. I think you’re deluding yourself if you don’t believe that, but that’s just my opinion. And yes, that’s exactly what I mean by “shouted down.” As for straw purchases and the black market, you ask a good question: why aren’t those laws being enforced? Could it be that Congress, which the NRA has by the short hairs, is unwilling to fund BATFE sufficiently so that they’re actually capable of enforcing those laws? No, of course not!

And as for other “specifics” you might be looking for, could the lack of them possibly be due to the fact that the NRA basically coerced Congress to basically prohibit funding of any research into the question of what might work? No, couldn’t be! They would never do that! The NRA is dedicated to the truth, after all, right?

GAU-8

“Straw purchases” is currently a Federal crime, Congress has no involvement. It falls under the Attorney General. Ask yourself why this administration hasn’t pressed that harder. The ATF under the AG can also currently investigate and prosecute unscrupulous gun dealers. Why haven’t they? The ATF spent its money on Fast and Furious.

The CDC shot themselves in the foot when they came out with the predetermination they were going to build a case against guns. Is that truth? The outcome is predetermined.

Still haven’t defined “too easy” or “people who shouldn’t” but I’ve given you detailed specifics how the executive branch has current authority to address 80% of the source of criminal guns. Why then do they just want to address legislation that impacts the law abiding more than the criminal?

Ruckabumpkus

Congress has no involvement in something that’s a federal crime? You need to brush up on your high school civics.

GAU-8

They don’t. Not at this level. If the law is on the books then the executive branch has a duty to enforce the law
– the executive branch determines priorities

GAU-8

Yes I have explain how criminals obtain weapons illegally and how we already have laws to address 98%. Why are you so worried about 2% yet not screaming twice as hard for the executive branch to at least attempt to address 80%. If they cut that 80% by just 1/4…it has 10x greater impact than the 2% ever will

Ruckabumpkus

2% of guns in the US would be roughly six million of them. Are you saying six million guns in the hands of criminals is not too many?

Do you even peruse the FBI statistics? They publish them every year. Some data might help you understand reality.

Lt. Aldo Raine

I do my best to accumulate a collection that looks just like that. Maybe even better.

John Dilligaf

Nor would I ever attempt to restrict your free speech rights. You have a right to speak freely. I have a right to speak freely. Even the freak talking about the classical pianist down the page somewhere has a right to speak freely, although after trying to figure out what he was talking about by clicking on his avatar and seeing just a couple of his other posts, I’m not certain he shouldn’t be locked up just the same. I would be in favor of denying him a right to purchase or carry…so, yeah, not an absolute right, but a right subject to some scrutiny, always leaning heavily toward favoring the retention of your rights.

Sue de Nim

I think that “freak” posted on this page accidentally, intending to post somewhere else, in reply to someone who’s been posting in both places. Innocent mistake. Should we tell him about it?

John Dilligaf

You go ahead. I’ll just stay off his radar. Like I said, I tried to follow it back to the source and regretted it. I was curious what could initiate such an impassioned response about a performing classical pianist. Mostly he was defending a guy he claimed wasn’t his friend for not being a pedophile because the child in question was over the age of 11 (but less than 13).

Christopher Armour

Oh, you guys must be referring to DCGC, or whatever his name is. It’s a “bot”, not real person, and once you reply to it, it will follow you and make inflammatory comments trying illicit responses. Best to ignore it, that’s the only way to get it to leave. It cannot be reasoned with. It does have a human handler, but he has to be a real twisted nutter to continue with that program.

cargosquid

I do want everyone armed and trained. But, being a conservative, I am not one to push for mandatory government programs. Everyone has rights. Now…if you were in an organized militia, I would state that you HAD to have a gun.

Why do we need to subsidize guns when you can merely reduce the bureaucratic hurdles and reduce the prices to something reasonable. Get back to the 40’s and 50’s when you could go to the local hardware store and buy an inexpensive shotgun.

I understand that you are trying to imply that I am faking my interest and that I really don’t want poor people to have guns…but, unlike you, I don’t believe that the government should be in the business of subsidizing and mandating things like that.

Geralt_0f_Rivia

People have choices in this regard. I like having an automobile, but I don’t drive an Aston Martin because that is beyond what I’m willing to pay for.

If an individual desires to own a firearm but lacks the means to get the precise type or model that they want, they can either buy a new, lower quality firearm, or buy a used higher quality firearm, or if they’re in real bad financial shape, they can purchase a used one of low quality, or simply set aside money to save for a future purchase.

Christopher Armour

You don’t have to give a single penny to the gun industry. Come join the gun show loophole brigade! No background checks! Cash only! Fully automatic weapons for everyone! Woohoo!

Barry

“Blue” states typically have far higher financial barriers to getting and carrying a firearm. In places like NY, only the wealthy and connected are allowed to get a carry permit. In my very red state, no permit is required to buy a gun and a carry permit is cheap. So you have it backwards.

John Dilligaf

And, before anybody gets all hot and bothered, not needing a permit to purchase doesn’t relieve any firearm retailer, whatever state Barry lives in, from performing the federal background check, which is required when purchasing a firearm. He’s just saying you don’t also need special permission from your county sheriff like you do in Minnesota.

Barry

Right. My state isn’t like NJ where a woman like Carol Bowne can get slaughtered unarmed on her own property waiting for expensive “permission” from the state to be able to purchase a firearm for protection.

Christopher Armour

There are plenty of very low cost, yet very effective firearms. The Hi-Point 916 is 9mm semi-auto pistol with an MSRP of $189, and a retail price under $150. There is a market for these very simple yet effective firearms. Also, as illustrated below, there are groups that give guns to the financially disadvantaged.

Sparafucile

Why are you so intent on imposing your armchair sociology on others whom you don’t even know?

cargosquid

“In my view, conceal and carry creates more individuals who predictably will kill more young men and women of color. ”

And yet….with 15 million concealed carriers…that keeps NOT happening.

Barry

By far, the victims and perpetrators of gun violence are low or no income earning males of color with criminal records under the age of 30.

Fixed it for you. I’ll keep carrying.

SeeThroughYou

There have been commonly available pistols smaller than today’s cellphones since 1927.

japete

What about little children who love to play with parent’s cell phones? If mistaken for an actual phone, the potential for tragedy is too much of a risk. What if someone searching in their pockets or purses for their actual phone pulls this out instead? Yes. Things like that have happened. This is an idea foisted on us by someone who wants to profit over an idea that could potentially harm others. Follow the money.

bryanstrawser

It is a crime in Minnesota for a firearm to be left where a child can access it.

japete

It’s too late once a child is shot by accident or shoots someone by accident with one of these pistols. Prevention is the better way to saving lives.

bryanstrawser

So what ban would you like to argue for this time?

japete

Was the word ban mentioned anywhere?

John Dilligaf

Ban: officially or legally prohibit

Today’s Question itself: Should they be allowed to create…?

If not, then that would be a prohibition, or by definition, a ban.

Will

Guns that look like other things have existed since before the American Revolution. What exactly is the issue?

cargosquid

I’m sure the ATF will find one….or invent one.

Barry

““I walked towards the restroom and a little child, a boy about 7, saw me and said, ‘Mommy, mommy, that guy’s gotta gun,’” he said. “The whole restaurant of course turns and stares at you and I thought, ‘There’s just gotta be something better to do than this.’”

It’s called an inside the waistband holster. Nobody ever says “Mommy, mommy, that guy’s gotta gun” to me. If that is too much, then a small 380 in a good pocket holster will completely disappear and be far superior to this guy’s contraption.

He has a right to make it, but I don’t see the point.

Christopher Armour

It will sell, I guess that’s the point. People buy all kinds of useless stuff all the time. If it gets approved without being labeled an AOW, it will probably sell pretty well. If it gets hit with the $200 tax, sales will likely disappoint the creator. I’d probably buy one if I already had every other firearm I ever wanted.

Sue de Nim

And the gun fanatics continue to emerge from the woodwork. You people are amazing! Your zeal for your cause is almost like religious fervor. No, not almost. It really is a religion. The Gun is your god, what you look to for comfort, security and protection. The 2nd Amendment is divine revelation, not to be questioned or compromised, lest you become a heretic, an apostate, an infidel. The NRA is your prophet whose proclamations are sacred dogma. Your zeal for the Gun is akin to a jihadist’s for Allah. It’s idolatry, pure and simple. Don’t think so? Then answer me this: under what circumstances would you give up your guns? “When someone pries them out of my cold, dead hands”? So you’d rather be a martyr than betray your faith! Sure sounds like a religion to me.

Ruckabumpkus

Amen, Sister!

I’m not sure I’d go so far as to say that gun culture is a religion, but it does have remarkable similarities, as you rightly point out. Especially disturbing to me is when folks on the religious right align themselves politically with gun zealots in the GOP. Jesus pointedly said, “Take up your cross and follow,” when everyone was expecting the Messiah to come as a conquering hero who would say, “Take up your sword and follow.”

GAU-8

At what point would you give up your right to free speech? Your right to be secure from unwarranted search & seizure? Your right to due process? Your right to be free from cruel and unusual punishment?

Sue de Nim

Red herring…. I value those things, but unlike some folks and their guns, I don’t look to them for comfort, security and protection.

GAU-8

Not really….why do feel one right is any more or less important than another?

Because you don’t like guns? Many people said with respect to the NSA eavesdropping “I have nothing to hide.” Does that mean we should let the NSA continue?

Rights are not subject to the whims of a small vocal minority, nor even a vocal majority. That is why we don’t have a Democracy (mob rule) we have a Republic.

If someone puts a gun to your head and tells you to shut up, will you shut up, or assert your 1st Amendment right to keep talking?

Christopher Armour

That’s not how our legislative system works, that’s called criminal activity.

GAU-8

are you trying to assert that it’s ok to take rights away by force? if so, that’s why we have a right to keep and bear arms…the last king we had tried that….it didn’t work out so well for him.

if that is not what you are trying to assert…then what is your point?

Sue de Nim

Straw man.

GAU-8

no more of straw man than your hypothetical. but seriously are you asserting it’s ok to take rights by force.

what’s your point? someone in the act of committing a felony is your argument for negating rights?

Sue de Nim

You appear to be deliberately misconstruing my words. Of course I’m not asserting it’s okay to take rights by force, and I resent your implication that I might harbor such an abhorrent idea. In the religion I do in fact adhere to (not the absurd, insulting caricature “sgthwjack” presented), a warning sign that one might be falling into idolatry is if there’s something in one’s life that’s more important than one’s relationship with the true God. Anything one relies too much on for safety, security, protection, fulfillment, salvation, happiness, etc., is something one is at risk of making into an idol. I started this thread with the assertion that many people’s gun obsession verges on, or is in fact, idolatry. If you have no religious faith, then don’t bother replying, because this is irrelevant to you. My point in asking these questions is to ferret out what’s actually most important to you, and to suggest that you consider if your attitude toward it (whatever it is) might be idolatrous.

GAU-8

If this was an article on restriction or removal of any right I’d have the same opinion. The great thing about this country is the freedom of religion and freedom from religion. If you believe my holding to my rights somehow interferes with my relation with God then so be it. The fact you are trying to judge me would make me ask how are you using God, it seems that only God can judge, hiding behind God as a means to judge other men seems to reflect poorly on yourself. The right to keep and bear arms does not bring salvation, but it certainly provides a level of assurance that I can protect my family against evil, which includes the preservation of the Republic and Constitution in hopes my children can enjoy the same freedoms, including religious freedoms, I have. Take a look around at our own Governments – God is being stripped from society, and faith is becoming reviled. I would be, and am more concerned with that than whether my neighbor has 6 rifles, 2 shotguns and a pistol. Sure, you may think some of this is black helicopter stuff….but look around…..there is a real erosion of freedom in this country. Of all freedoms…I can be a good Christian, or Jew or whatever and still be a gun owner and 2A advocate. They are not mutually exclusive.

Sue de Nim

I do not believe anything in particular about your relationship to God, however you understand him, nor am I judging you in any way. Your phraseology suggests you might consider yourself Christian, but I don’t know that. My only intention in this thread is to get folks to reflect on their priorities and consider whether their emphasis on guns and the 2nd Amendment might be out of balance. A good question to ask is whether your attitude about guns is shaped by what you believe about God, or whether what you believe about God is shaped by your attitude about guns. And then you might also substitute for “guns” in that question such things as politics, patriotism, and even Freedom. If you believe in God, is God your first priority or not. If not, are you really being faithful to your God?

Ruckabumpkus

More specifically, do you read gun magazines more than you read your Bible (or whatever your religion has)? Do you spend more time at the rifle range than in your religious activities?

GAU-8

Why do you believe being Christian and a gun owner can’t coexist. I question your logic. Putting God first means I have to be defenseless? I have a hard time believing that?

Sue de Nim

I don’t believe that at all. The only question I raised is what’s most important to you. Being a Christian doesn’t exclude owning guns. If you consider keeping firearms to be a good way for you to honor God by serving your neighbors (and defending others from harm is certainly a good way to serve them), then good for you. To my mind, the Christian faith does exclude hating anyone or seeking revenge. Some Christians think it excludes self-defense, and I respect that opinion but don’t insist on it. But I question the logic of any Christian who thinks their faith precludes using deadly force to defend others. In fact, I think the Christian faith requires it, so long as it’s not excessive but proportional to the threat.

But hypothetically, if being a Christian were incompatible with owning guns, which would you choose? Anything you’re not willing to give up for the sake of your faith is an idol.

Christopher Armour

What? You sure love your hypotheticals.

Sue de Nim

Hypotheticals are a good way of exploring issues.

Christopher Armour

Yeah, but not if they’re nonsensical in nature.

GAU-8

If you are trying to paint me into a corner forget it. It’s not, so there is no value in this game. I believe you misunderstand your faith.

Sue de Nim

Now you’re illustrating the point I made in my initial post in this thread. You’re making your gun rights into an absolute on par with divine revelation. I don’t think the 2nd Amendment is contrary to my faith, but I’m aware it’s a human construction, not holy scripture.

GAU-8

Great..yes…but. …Amendment I. Congress shall make no law respecting an establishment of religion, or prohibiting the free exercise thereof; or abridging the freedom of speech, or of the press; or the right of the people peaceably to assemble, and to petition the government for a redress of grievances.

So, call me a pagan…. A sinner…I don’t happen to agree…but it doesn’t matter…(1) you are not qualified to sit in judgement…(2) while you are entitled to your opinion, I am equally entitled not care about it.

Have a nice day

Jed

False premise. If wearing clothes was incompatible with your sense of the natural order, which would you choose?

GAU-8

So who are you to judge your neighbor?

James 4:12

Sue de Nim

Not judging but challenging. You don’t have to justify anything to me. The appropriateness (or not) of your attitude about guns is between you and God.

Lt. Aldo Raine

What on Earth do God and guns have anything to do with one another? If a law abiding citizen owns a thousand guns, how is that in anyway in opposition to Christianity? A gun is a tool, a recreational device and an object of skill and competition. It’s only evil men that turn that inanimate object into something objectionable. Would owning darts and a dartboard be in opposition to God? Is defending your family from evil contrary to the teachings of Christianity? You conflate the activity of evil men, with the tool ownership of righteous souls, and it’s you that are lost. There are more than 300 million firearms in the U.S. and an estimated 100 million gun owners or household members of gun owners yet only 0.0084% of those people commit evil acts and you have indicted everyone. That’s foolish in the extreme.

Jed

Outstanding comment, Lt.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Worse yet, you can bet she thinks she’s a wizard of logic connecting the two. Metacognitively deficient. Dunning-Kruger Effect.

Sue de Nim

Actually, his presumption that he understood my comment and felt qualified to comment on it the way he did is an example of the Dunning-Kruger effect.

Once again, my comments are twisted, either ignorantly or deliberately, and taken to mean what they clearly do not.

Ruckabumpkus

“What on Earth do God and guns have anything to do with one another?”

If you’re a Christian, don’t you believe that God is concerned about everything, including your attitude about guns?

Lt. Aldo Raine

I think it’s you that has an issue with guns, and somehow you think God has your same hoplophobia. God is capable of knowing a person’s heart and soul, and therefor doesn’t attach human emotions and concerns to objects. I think in your head, guns are like pornography, and the mere possession of them runs afoul of God, but that’s just in your head.

? sgthwjack

That one seems to simply be a believer in a different “religion.”

“There is one religion more dangerous than any other. It has been responsible for more murder and suffering than all others combined. Its followers blindly accept its rhetoric without question, while allowing themselves to be enslaved by its policies. This religion’s worshipers are so inured that they have accepted its rules as laws and will obey them even to their own detriment.
This religion is called STATISM.”

Sue de Nim

If by “that one,” you’re referring to me, your comment completely misses the mark and reveals that you are an ignorant fool, presuming to understand what you do not, and that you have no curiosity about actually understanding the opinions of others. What you’ve described as a religion of “statism” (not even your idea; you’re just parroting someone else) is so far afield from what I believe that it’s laughable. Don’t bother replying. You’re not worth my time to dialog with.

? sgthwjack

You apparently failed to note the word “seems.” So what do you look to for your defense and/or security? Rights and opinions are two entirely different things. Absent the juvenile name calling, if you please.

Sue de Nim

I did notice your “seems,” and the fact that what I wrote “seems” to imply what you asserted is what clued me into the fact that you were being foolish. As for what I actually do believe, you could take a stab at reading what I’ve written.

? sgthwjack

No response to my question noted, as expected.

Sue de Nim

I most certainly did respond. I referred you to my previous comments, which you have misconstrued or ignored.

? sgthwjack

So you depend upon religion, regardless of what sort. Your choice, as it should be. Good luck.

Jed

Did you not recently call support for the 2nd Amendment a religion? How else are we to understand your comment:

“Your zeal for your cause is almost like religious fervor. No, not
almost. It really is a religion. The Gun is your god, what you look to
for comfort, security and protection. The 2nd Amendment is divine
revelation, not to be questioned or compromised, lest you become a
heretic, an apostate, an infidel.”

Is it then really such a leap to ascribe to you the possibility of considering the state with the same zeal you accuse others of having toward the 2nd Amendment? It would appear that you feel justified in making assumptions about others, but take umbrage when others make assumptions about you, and then dismiss them. Perhaps we should take a superior tack toward mutual understanding.

Sue de Nim

No, I observed that gun obsession, for some folks, seems to have the character of a religion. As evidence of that, I referred to the slavish adherence tot he 2nd Amendment, as if it were divinely revealed. I’ll admit to some rhetorical overstatement, but the zeal of many of the gun activists I’ve encountered really does look a lot like religious fervor. I suppose an obsession with the State could rise to that level, too, but nothing I’ve posted even remotely suggests I’m zealous for the notion of the State, which is why I took umbrage at the assumption that I did. If you take umbrage at my suggestion that the Gun serves as a god for some folks, that’s your prerogative. If it made anyone consider whether they might have an unhealthy attachment to their guns (even if only to construct a self-justification why they don’t), I’ve succeeded.

Jed

I take no umbrage whatsoever from your contention, I merely doubt its veracity. Speaking only from my own necessarily limited experience, I have never met an advocate of the 2nd who exhibits anything like the zealotry of which you speak. I’m well enough acquainted with literally hundreds of such people to have observed that tendency were it present among any of them. On the other hand, not all, but a very high percentage of the people with whom I’ve discussed the issue who do support serious restraints on gun ownership do in fact tend to also hold views in other areas that I do consider statist in nature, and many of them are quite passionate about those views, to say the least. You are obviously convinced that some people “have an unhealthy attachment to their guns” — that might be, but I’ve never met any of them, and neither has anyone with whom I’ve spoken.

Sue de Nim

Well then, bully for you. My experience is clearly different from yours.

Jed

It is the differences between us that helps make life interesting, is it not?

Sue de Nim

One further note about that: I know of no one who
self-identifies as a “statist.” The label of “statism” is only used by
those who are characterizing others, invariably as a derogatory term and an accusation. I’ve never seen the word used objectively or dispassionately.

Ruckabumpkus

The response of gun activists every time the subject comes up sure looks like zealotry to me. “They can have my guns when they pry them from my cold, dead hands” are the words of a zealot. Your own rhetoric comes across as zealotry. I comment on lots of issues and topics. I go look at the Disqus history of gun activists and it looks like most of the topics they comment on are about guns. Obsession and zealotry are apt terms for that behavior.

Jed

You are in desperate need of looking into a mirror.

Ruckabumpkus

I’m not the one who’s single-issue obsessed. If I post a lot on this topic, that’s only because it’s the most likely to provoke knee-jerk replies that demand responses.

Jed

So you are a self admitted troll. Unlike you, my profile is not locked. Had you bothered to check on my posting history, you would have noticed that I am not “single-issue obsessed.” It seems that, at least in your case, cowardice and sloth go hand-in-hand.

Ruckabumpkus

You have a strange idea of what a troll is. By the way, I noticed that you’re one of the misguided souls who upvoted OHJonesy’s insulting, biggoted, hateful post that implied that men who don’t like guns must be gay (and by implication insinuated there’s something wrong with being gay, which I’m not btw).

Jed

You wrote: “If I post a lot on this topic, that’s only because it’s the most likely to provoke knee-jerk replies that demand responses.” That is the definition of a troll.

Ruckabumpkus

Okay, I see how you misunderstood that. What I mean is this. If I post on most other topics, I get maybe one or two replies, mostly civil, and the discussion ends without lots of follow-up posts. If I post on this topic, it tends to provoke knee-jerk replies that demand responses, which, if I answer them, provoke further knee-jerk replies. It’s those knee-jerk replies that I consider trolling.

Jed

You mean the “knee-jerk replies” that you sought to elicit?

Ruckabumpkus

Only a masochist would seek to elicit responses like those that come my way on this topic. That’s not me.

Jed

Of course it is. You are a classic example of a brash young man going into tough bars looking for a fight. In the real world, you would soon discover that when you go out looking for a fight you would likely get what you want. The only difference here is that unlike this digital fantasy, in the real world you would learn a real lesson.

Ruckabumpkus

I posted on this page, because I like participating in Minnesota Public Radio’s “Today’s Question.” You’re not a regular on these pages. You (and lots of others) jumped in only because it’s a discussion about guns. You picked the fight.

Jed

The internet is a wonderful thing, isn’t it?

Cletus B Neckbeard

No, the people who won’t respect the Constitution and my natural rights are the ones who “picked the fight.”

This is what we get for teaching Self Esteem Uber Alles to an entire generation of kids.

I for one couldn’t be more ashamed that my generation did this.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Man, ain’t that the truth?!

? Bucksergeant ✓ ᵛᶦᶫᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Ouch!

cargosquid

Thanks for admitting that you are an uninformed troll.

Ruckabumpkus

Didn’t bother to look at the rest of this thread, did you? You’re the one who’s been trolling in the last few minutes.

cargosquid

I’ve read most of it.

Nothing in it by you shows that you are informed…..and you admitted to being an uninformed troll.

Well done.

Ruckabumpkus

I admitted to no such thing, which you’d understand if you actually read all that I wrote.

cargosquid

“If I post a lot on this topic, that’s only because it’s the most likely to provoke knee-jerk replies that demand responses.”

The very definition of a troll.

Ruckabumpkus

And you deliberately took that quote out of context. Because apparently too lazy look at the rest of that thread, I’ll quote my clarifications again for you: “What I mean is this. If I post on most other topics, I get maybe one or
two replies, mostly civil, and the discussion ends without lots of
follow-up posts. If I post on this topic, it tends to provoke knee-jerk
replies that demand responses, which, if I answer them, provoke further
knee-jerk replies. It’s those knee-jerk replies that I consider
trolling.” And “I posted on this page, because I like participating in Minnesota Public
Radio’s ‘Today’s Question.’ You’re not a regular on these pages. You
(and lots of others) jumped in only because it’s a discussion about
guns. You picked the fight.” You’re the troll here.

cargosquid

No…I read that.

We aren’t trolling. We are actually refuting your statements. Its not my problem that your stated actions are the definition of trolling.
No…we aren’t regulars. This is a topic that we enjoy. Its on Disqus. And each, individually, have chosen to defend the 2nd and refute bigoted arguments such as yours.

Ruckabumpkus

If by YOUR definition (which I don’t accept), I’m a troll, well, Gotcha! You bit, didn’t you? And the way you and lots of others bit exposed the lie that gun activists are fine, upstanding, respectable, respectful, people of honor and integrity. Instead, you confirmed the impression that among you are lots of insensitive, boorish, bigoted, hateful, arrogant, puerile people, who who are so obsessed with the issue that they go out of their way to find places on the web to rant about it and deride those who disagree with them, and there are apparently no grown-ups among you to tell you to knock it off. That’s your gun culture for you.

Sue de Nim

You forgot “misogynistic.”

cargosquid

No…by your own words.

Again…if you are having problems with multiple people, you are probably what’s wrong. Check your bigotry.

Ruckabumpkus

Keep posting. You’re proving my point.

cargosquid

Only according to you.

Sue de Nim

Accusing others of what you’re doing can be an effective way to deflect attention from yourself. It’s a well known tactic of Saul Alinsky. Who did you learn it from?

cargosquid

Since I’m not doing that…you would be wrong. I am pointing out that he admitted to making statements merely to get “kneejerk responses” as he defines it. That is not a statement that says he wants a discussion. He merely wants to express his bigotry.

Sue de Nim

I’m sure you believe that.

cargosquid

Yes….yes I do.

cargosquid

Yes. I do.

? OHJonesy

Your anti-rights rhetoric comes across as zealotry and obsession as well, so what’s your point? That both sides of the debate believe in what they write about? Hardly a keen observation. But why to you hide being a locked dashboard? My comments are wide open for anyone to see. Unlock yours so we can see.

Ruckabumpkus

You want to troll me on other pages, right?

? OHJonesy

I have far better things to do than follow your childish blather. I just want to see how true your statement is.

Wiz

I wonder about that myself. They should all be open without the option. IMHO

cargosquid

I’ll reply to you.

You’ve just described your entire position in regards to us.

Well done. You’ve discovered “projection.”

Sue de Nim

I don’t feed trolls.

cargosquid

Not a troll.

Pointing out that you actually described your position in regards to us.

Perhaps self-reflection will do you some good.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

So now you’re on a hunger strike? Is that our fault too?

Sue de Nim

If so, then it goes both ways.

GAU-8

so you would give up your rights?

cargosquid

“I don’t look to them for comfort, security and protection.”

And you can read minds and determine that about others?

You don’t look upon the protection of your civil rights and liberties as security and protection? Okay then….

Ruckabumpkus

Suppose your spouse (assuming you have one) says to you: “I can’t stand your obsession with guns any more. Either they go, or I go.” Which do you choose to keep? If it’s the guns, I think Sue has a point.

Christopher Armour

Suppose…so on to hypothetical scenarios now. If my spouse and I were that ideologically different, I suppose we wouldn’t of gotten married in the first place.

Ruckabumpkus

That’s assuming you knew, or that it wasn’t a case of your spouse getting fed up with it after the wedding.

Christopher Armour

That’s not the ideological difference I was talking about. Respect for the exercise of ones rights is what I’m referring to. A difference like that would’ve shown up long before marriage.

? sgthwjack

Bingo!

GAU-8

Suppose your girlfriend said I don’t understand why you hate guns…i want a gun or else…do you allow her to get a gun or let her leave?

Ruckabumpkus

I’m not going to tell any woman she can’t have a gun to protect herself, if having one makes her feel safer. But if, having acquired one, she becomes obsessed with guns and starts buying lots of them and subscribing to all the gun magazines and (heaven forfend) supporting the NRA, I might be the spouse who says, “them or me.”

GAU-8

ok..so we are adding hypothetical upon hypothetical…you could say the same thing about cars, video games, motorcycles, golf clubs, beanie babies…..that’s not a 2A issue..your strawman is collapsing on you…do you have a salient point?

Ruckabumpkus

I agree, it’s not a 2nd Amendment issue. This thread (that Sue started) is about people being unhealthily obsessed (to the point of it being a false religion, in her view) with guns. I happen to agree with that. And yes, the same thing would apply to other unhealthy obsessions. The difference with guns, to my mind, is that an obsession with tools designed for killing people is a bit more disturbing than an obsession with such things as “cars, video games, motorcycles, golf clubs, beanie babies…..” I’m not talking about taking away your rights. I’m questioning your character, if you’re obsessed with guns.

GAU-8

Why? It’s legal (a protected right), and if I can afford it why not? 99.97+ % of lawful gun owners (legally allowed to own a gun) never commit a crime with them. In TX for example a conceal carry permit holder is 14x less likely that the average citizen to commit any crime. In another study they found people with gun collections also highly unlikely to commit gun crimes (they have the cash, why commit a crime).

Ruckabumpkus

Sure, go right ahead. But I have no duty to approve of it, or to respect your choice. And if you’re obsessed with guns, I’m within my rights to question your character.

J F Hanson

No one is doubting your right to question one’s character. I for one, however, am questioning the speculations you make and the sanity in doing so.

It is simply silly. But, I know, antigunners are like that, aren’t they?

Ruckabumpkus

If you’re implying that a gun obsession is a sign of good character, I respectfully disagree with you.

J F Hanson

It is neither good nor bad–but the belief you can make such determinations without the basic knowledge for doing so demonstrates you are the one who is obsessed.

Ruckabumpkus

Really? I’m not the one with a killing tool as my avatar.

J F Hanson

I admit it; you are a master of the implied slur–but have no foundation for it.

Ruckabumpkus

But didn’t you invite that slur when you chose that avatar? The impression it gives is that you’re a gun zealot. If it’s giving a false impression of who you are, you might consider changing it. Unless, of course, it’s your intention to give a false impression, which says something else about you. In any case, you are responsible for the message you’re giving with your choice of avatar.

Judging by the hateful humor I’ve been subjected to, which you upvoted, I don’t think they’re screwed up at all. It’s gun culture that’s screwed up.

Christopher Armour

The “hateful” humor didn’t start until well after it was discovered your completely bigoted disregard of the rights of others.

Ruckabumpkus

“Bigoted disregard of the rights of others” is a deliberate mischaracterization of what I’ve written. And your persistence in defending what is clearly beyond the pale in civilized society is only strengthening my impression that gun nuts tend to be obnoxious boors. I’d be happy to be proved wrong about that.

Christopher Armour

I’ve had plenty of conversations with controllists such as yourself, they don’t all have to go this way. We ended up in a negative place because of your preconceived notions about guns, gun owners, etc….

Ruckabumpkus

Those notions aren’t preconceived at all. They come from experience with actual gun nuts, and you’re confirming them.

Christopher Armour

I believe in the right of everyone to prepare for their own self defense in whatever manner they see fit. If you choose to own what even I would consider an arsenal, great. If you choose to remove even pointy sticks from your property because they’re too dangerous, great. I don’t attack non-gun owners for their choices, as is the case with most gun owners. It’s the gun control side of this debate that consistently makes mischaracterizations, manipulates data, and comes up with laws that are ineffectual in addressing the culture problem leading to gun crimes. It’s not “gun nuts” causing all of these gun deaths. The suggestion that we are in someway responsible for what criminals do with their weapons, that brings us out of the woodwork everytime. For instance, the idea that a cell phone gun will lead to an increase in gun crime….just dumb.

cargosquid

If you are getting negative reactions from MULTIPLE people….the problem is YOU….. You are the common denominator.

cargosquid

No…he didn’t. Because there is nothing wrong in owning guns and protecting civil liberties.

J F Hanson

Yes, I invited that slur, just as women who wear what you will call ‘provocative’ dress will invite undesirable (and worse) attention.

It really is time to give up your strawman and retreat while the others take the field.

Ruckabumpkus

That is a completely inapt analogy.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

In your case, I think the word would be inept

cargosquid

Good analogy.

Sue de Nim

Your analogy implies that objecting to an image suggestive of violence is comparable to rape. You’re trivializing a violent crime.

J F Hanson

as with many of your criticisms, the conclusion you reach is indicative of your prejudices.

IOW, don’t be silly. You’re adopting the same response style as Rucka..,uses, and it’s to her disadvantage and yours.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

These people are amazing aren’t they?

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Ohhh
A killing tool? I guess none of my tools are “broke in” yet as they haven’t completed their “mission”.

Ruckabumpkus

Regardless of whether you’ve actually killed anyone with them, that’s what they’re designed for, right? A gun that’s not designed to use for killing wouldn’t be much of a gun, would it?

cargosquid

You premise is false.
The obsession is with protecting civil liberties. We’ve chosen this one to defend.

GAU-8

Have at it. It’s just not within.your rights to infringe on my rights.

cargosquid

We don’t need your approval. Nor do we care about your opinion about our character since, based on your statements, you don’t know what you are talking about. You are biased and bigoted.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

As we have no duty of approve of or respect yours . Legal guns equal a lack of character? What circles do you travel in?

Ruckabumpkus

Didn’t say “legal guns equal a lack of character.” I remarked that an obsession with guns is raises questions about a person’s character. Deliberately misconstruing comments you don’t like seems to be a standard tactic of you gun zealots.

Sue de Nim

The misconstruing of the comments might not be deliberate. It might be a sign of paranoia, which would be understandable. Feeling compelled to stockpile an arsenal of weapons and ammo is clearly paranoid.

Jed

What color is the sky in your world?

Christopher Armour

So, one gun is ok, more than one, or support for an organization that defends her right, not ok.

It says that you don’t have support or friends that share your principles.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Oh, nose… he used the “B” word, y’all

Steveglen

^^^
Classic.

Sue de Nim

Your insinuation that disliking guns is unmanly, or that being a real man entails approving of guns, reflects a lack of emotional maturity. Same goes for your choice of humor subject. I suggest you grow up.

? OHJonesy

Thank you for the suggestion Sue, I will certainly take it under consideration.

In the meantime, may I suggest the same advice for you and Rucka, who between the two of you have hurled over a half-dozen “Gun Nuts” insults (and a few others) at people here who in no way, shape or form are endorsing violence of any kind.

If you two want to be treated with respect, I suggest starting by treating those with opinions that differ from you the same way. But if you’re going to go in throwing jabs, don’t give us the fake indignation when someone jabs back.

Have a nice day.

Rhetorical Brutality

Strange, isn’t it, the extent to which that vaunted “tolerance” and “diversity” of theirs is a one-way street?

? OHJonesy

LOL, strange indeed! The ratified air of their moral high ground must make it hard for them to recognize their own hypocrisy.

Cletus B Neckbeard

That’s not methane?

Cletus B Neckbeard

I’d rather use him for the urinal he/she is. Is that wrong of me?

? OHJonesy

LOL, where’s that line start? I get the feeling it’s going to be a long one!

Sue de Nim

Apparently I need a gun to protect myself from the likes of you.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Doubtful you’d pass a background check to buy a gun. But then we are not assaulting you with anything other than facts

Sue de Nim

And hints that I might get raped (or get forcibly urinated on) if I continue to disagree with you folks, which you would have seen if you had read the context of the note I was replying to. You folks complain about “liberals” hating your inanimate guns, while you prodigiously spout hateful rhetoric toward actual human beings.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

The only talk I see about being raped is by you. But I do see a lot of hyperbole and fainted outrage on the anti Constitution side.

Sue de Nim

From the thread I was replying to: “I’d rather use him for the urinal he/she is. Is that wrong of me?” Wasn’t sure that was about me at first, because of the use of “him,” but in context it clearly was. Either that’s about rape, or it’s about forcibly (because it wouldn’t be willing) urinating on someone. It’s because of that sort of rhetoric that people are afraid of you folks. Not afraid of your guns; afraid of you.

Ruckabumpkus

In the boys’/men’s locker rooms I used to frequent, using a woman as a “urinal” was slang for rape. Sue is correct and should not have backed off from her assertion that Neckbeard and the yahoos who agreed with him were talking about gang rape. Shame on you, on two counts! One, for denying that she was threatened with rape, and two, that for defending the yahoos who threatened it!

Lt. Aldo Raine

That’s why you think everyone shouldn’t have guns. Your own instability. Somebody disagreed with you and you immediately think you need guns to kill them. You feel that you can’t be trusted to own them for yourself, because you would surely kill someone over some petty dispute, and you think everyone else is just like you.

Relax, we’re not like you at all.

Sue de Nim

It’s not that they disagreed with me. It’s that they thought it was admirable to express a desire to use me as a urinal (and it’s not unreasonable to assume that was code for gang rape). Isn’t that the kind of thing you’d want a gun to protect yourself from?

Lt. Aldo Raine

You thought that a group of Constitutional conservatives wanted to, “gang rape” you? Next, I’m sure you’ll be afraid that a bunch of Baptists are going to start blowing people up with explosive vests. Here I thought your problem was a twisted view of gun ownership, and all along, you were just bat sh*t crazy.

Sue de Nim

Whether they were “Constitutional conservatives” is irrelevant. They considered it appropriate to say they’d like to use me as a urinal. It’s certainly within their free speech rights to make such comments in a forum like this. But if I thought they knew who I was and where to find me, they could probably be convicted of making terroristic threats. The Constitution is about governing civil society. People who do that sort of thing demonstrate that they are not interested in civility. Unless you’re willfully blind, you’d have to admit that not all self-described Constitutional conservatives are as virtuous as you consider yourself to be. Merely being a Constitutional conservative does not mean one is necessarily honorable in other matters of one’s character.

Lt. Aldo Raine

In your mind, if someone said, “I would like to pee on you,” that constitutes, “terroristic threats.” Thank God the law is applied in a fashion where “reasonableness” is a key factor. You’re kind of nutty.

Sue de Nim

Given that it wouldn’t happen without coercion (unless you’re so deluded that you think I would welcome such a gesture) a threat of violence is absolutely implicit in the comment. Even if I were to be ambushed and caught by surprised by people peeing on me, there’s precedent for that being prosecuted as assault. Either way, a bunch of yahoos agreed that they’d all like to commit an act of violence against me. The fact that they might consider themselves “Constitutional conservatives” is completely irrelevant to the fact that it was a hateful, abusive, demeaning comment. The fact that you seem to be defending them says I have no basis for respecting your opinion about anything. People who do that sort of thing are not displaying the kind of moral character that should be required before trusting someone with deadly weapons.

Ruckabumpkus

Another commenter on this page expressed a desire to use her as a “urinal.” In the boys’/men’s locker room slang I was subjected to, that was slang for rape. When someone suggested that, and a bunch of others upvoted it, it was entirely reasonable to take that as a threat of gang rape. Your denial or minimization of that highly abusive comment is shameful.

Lt. Aldo Raine

Holy crap. Maybe in the neo-feminist support group that you attend at the YWCA, where everything men say means “rape,” you have come to this conclusion, but in the real world, you’re just a crazy leftist.

Ruckabumpkus

Most men I know, “Constitutional conservatives” included, are fine, honorable people. Not all are, however. And the fact that you’re joining in with a bunch of misogynistic yahoos who think it’s great fun to call a woman a “urinal” tells me all I need to know about your honor. You give lip service to protecting “your own women,” but the contempt for women that you and the rest of these gun zealots are showing says there’s a different attitude beneath the surface.

As for being a “leftist,” you know nothing of my political opinions. My friends who are feeling the Bern keep accusing me of being a right-winger. Denouncing everyone who disagrees with you as an extremist on the other side is a sign that you’re an unhinged, unthinking zealot.

Sue de Nim

Would you come alone to do that, or would it be gang rape? And with attitudes like that, why does it surprise you that people have their doubts whether you should be trusted with guns?

Cletus B Neckbeard

With totalitarian attitudes like yours, you could do anything and, in fact, are likely to implore your government to do so. Here’s a little history on the damage your ilk do:

Try harder on the stupidity; you haven’t made me weep uncontrollably yet for the future of humanity.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

So, we have another liberal feminazi crying rape in a discussion. Wow, these people…
Next it will be guns are racist. These people have hoplophobia .
Always ready to use lies and hyperbole to further their fascism and destruction of the Constitution.
Is there any wonder why we don’t trust you guys with sharp objects and the right to vote?

Cletus B Neckbeard

EmotiKKKretins rule! Cognitives drool!

Steveglen

From a ‘gun nut’, I carried a short barrel .44 Mag Ruger for bear protection for about 20 years on my long hikes, alone, trout fishing in CA’s forests.
When the streams dried up, and the trips stopped, I realized I had never fired it, not a single time.
A gun is a tool, not a toy.

? OHJonesy

Absolutely right Steve, and a gun in the hands of law-abiding citizens have saved far more lives than guns in lawless hands have taken. It’s far better to have it and not need it, than to realize you really need it, but don’t have it.

Sparafucile

Being afraid of inanimate designed-for-safety objects is not ONLY unmanly, it’s unwomanly. It’s childish. It’s like being afraid of the dark, or of paintings.

Cletus B Neckbeard

It’s called “mockery.” It seems to be the only thing the cognitively underdeveloped seem to relate to. Logic, reason, and facts are wasted on them.

Sue de Nim

And that’s the sort of thing that gives people the impression that guns are your way to make up for a deficiency in your masculinity. Now go play with your codpieces, er, I mean, guns.

Cletus B Neckbeard

See what I mean? Metacognition and self-awareness–look into ’em. Here’s a good place to start:

Do you think that changing the subject will add any validity to what you say?

cargosquid

Awww…. you went and followed the playbook and commented about masculinity.

That’s just so sad.

Sue de Nim

Actually, no. I was responding to a thread started by a gun nut who seemed to imply that disliking guns is unmanly. If you think you need guns to be a real man, isn’t that a sign that you’re insecure about your masculinity?

cargosquid

It’s called humor.
Real men and real women are not anti-gun. Because it is right to keep and bear them. If you afraid of exercising a right and advocate to restrict it out of fear…you are not being an adult.

john

Sue, you are not a moral authority. You really do not know what you are talking about.

Lt. Aldo Raine

Why do leftists always descend to, “Your dick is small,” when their ideas and arguments fail? Is that how all of your disagreements go? Someone opposes you = small dick. The leftist mind is a strange place.

cargosquid

I don’t know about you, but I fully admit that I compensate for the fact that my junk cannot fire 9mm projectiles at 1500 fps with any accuracy. And I’m tired of having to get within three feet of an attacker so I can club him down with it.

That’s old, cargosquid. Marty has sent me this about three dozens times. Yawn….

cargosquid

Its not for you. You already know that you are a pederast.

DGJC

No, I’m no pederast. Did you forget I’m a homosexual? DUH!

DGJC

1 I didn’t know what a bot was until you conservative morons mentioned it.
2 I’m proud to say I’m computer illiterate, and therefore wouldn’t know how to operate a bot.
3 I’m not DGCJ, dumb dumb.

cargosquid

Yes..you are DGCJ. You are using a sockpuppet.

DGJC

Nope.

john

LOL thanks, I needed that laugh!

john

That is just ignorant and mean spirited.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

^5

Cletus B Neckbeard

Thanks!

john

I wish I could give you more than one upvote. You deserve it.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Thanks, John.

Lt. Aldo Raine

I guess that all depends on where you’re from and the lifestyle in which you were raised. The only “men” that I know that have a dislike for guns, have a purse and high-heel collection. I have lived all over the world and the “European” mindset about guns is suicidal on a large scale. It’s why people like Hitler and Stalin just basically walked into other countries and took over, and it’s why Islam threatens to do the same in modern day Europe.

john

The sexist anti-men can try to bully men all they want. I just know what it means to be a man, and I do not need a bunch of smug effete snobs like DGCJ or a bunch of hateful feminists to tell me what manhood means. I have been married for 45 years, and we started running around together when she was 12 and I was 14. I have 2 successful standup kids that I like, and we live in comfortable retirement. I feel pretty good about my life. I do pretty much what I want, and am not afraid of what these folks say. They show no respect, probably because they have no respect for themselves.

DGJC

Agreed. These conservative idiots travel around in a gang and upvote each others idiotic comments. They act like 12 year olds. Disgusting. And, they wonder why they’re losing elections?

john

Sue, show some respect. You really do not know who you are talking to.

Sue de Nim

Really? How about telling those misogynists you’ve been upvoting to show some respect?

john

You relying on man-bashing rhetoric just illustrates you own myopia.

Sue de Nim

How is calling misogyny misogyny “man-bashing”?

john

Listen to yourself talk. You choose to distort the argument and use rhetoric that is outdated, and irrelevant.

Sue de Nim

You don’t think making crude allusions to gang rape is “outdated” and “irrelevant”? You jumped into a conversation where I was responding to vile comments by a group of yahoos that want the world to believe they can be trusted with arsenals of firearms. You might want to be more careful about who you choose to stick up for.

john

Your are correct that I am guilty of jumping in on an ongoing conversation. HOWEVER, your sexism has nothing to do with my politics or participation in anyone else’s values, except that I harshly jealously defend my civil rights about gun ownership. Grow some thicker skin.

Sue de Nim

So, you’re saying that if I express my views about the necessity of better gun safety laws in America, I should just expect to have misogynistic insults hurled at me? That’s just the price I have to pay for sharing my opinion, so I have no cause to object? That sounds like what you’re saying when you suggest that I “grow some thicker skin.” The point has been clearly made in this discussion that there’s a loud and rowdy segment of America’s gun culture (not all of it, to be sure) that is incapable of civilized behavior, and you’re sticking up for them.

john

I criticize your comments based on what you say, your ill manners, and narcissism and conceit. It has nothing to do with gender. It is offensive that you try to use that as a defense.

The same old geezers upvoted that comment. Why am I not surprised? I’m
beginning to think that the only conservatives left in this country are
the 20 of you that travel around Disqus and upvote each other all day
and night………Get lives, People.

Dang, Sarge, that’s powerful. That put a tear in the eye and a lump in the throat, thanks for sharing that, my brother!

? sgthwjack

Knights still exist, simply with more modern gear.

Sue de Nim

What century do you think you’re living in? Do you realize (no, I’m sure you don’t) how demeaning to women that comment sounds? The sentiment expressed in the image you attached isn’t so bad — kind of noble in fact — but it needs to be updated to allow for a soldier being “she.” But your comment, to which you attached that picture, is paternalistic, patronizing and patriarchal. Are the women and girls in your life aware of the way you infantilize them? “Don’t worry your pretty head, little lady; I’ll take care of you.” If you really think women are incapable of taking care of themselves in 2016, you haven’t been paying attention for, well, ever.

Lt. Aldo Raine

I’m not sure if you’re aware of this, but they just opened up the possibility of women combat soldiers just a few months ago, but other than a couple of PR stunt recruits, they don’t exist yet. I was in the military, and women soldiers don’t even have to qualify under the same qualifications that men do. When they change that and force women to be equal, and not dumb down the qualifications like the do for police and firefighters, then I’ll change what I say, so as to not hurt your feelings.

Sue de Nim

No response to my main point in that comment, that you’re infantalizing the women in your life? Or am I to assume that you don’t have any women in your life, other than your mom, and maybe sisters? I can’t imagine a real woman wanting to be associated with you if she had any choice.

Lt. Aldo Raine

The women in my life are not nutty social justice neo-feminists, so I don’t have to feed their delusions or walk on egg shells around their perpetual victimhood, anger, misery and man-hate. There are so many metrosexual feminine men walking around with their SJW feminist handbook of proper pronouns and PC jargon, that real women are willing to do just about anything to have a real man in their life. They have seen these poor excuses for men, you know the ones YOU like, that cry watching their TV programs, need their safe spaces when they didn’t get a trigger warning, have 12 cats, can’t change their own oil and spend more time talking about the Kardashians than being a man.

john

Oh, Hell, Yeah!

john

Sue, grow some spine. You sure do take offense easily and get mean.

Jed

Having had a life-long appreciation for strong women, I see your point, although it does not negate his. One of my great-grandmothers backed down Quantrill. A dear friend of mine was born in 1900 and grew up in a NM mountain mining camp, now a ghost town. Both were very strong women, and both were very much true ladies.

Women constitute the fastest growing demographic among new gun owners and concealed carry permit holders. Contrary to popular media myth, a 120 pound woman can’t generally knock around a couple of 220 pound men like toys; their desire for a weapon to even the odds is understandable, and does not make them less feminine. A young friend of mine (who happens to be a lesbian) carries and is a crack shot. All that having been said, all of those women I mentioned, including the last, appreciate men who are capable of fighting for them, and have no respect for those who are not.

john

I do not like your rhetoric, even if I do agree with you.

Ruckabumpkus

When you praise the rhetoric of someone who thinks it’s great fun to call a woman a “urinal,” you have no standing to comment negatively on anyone else’s rhetoric.

john

Try reading my comment again. Or are you being intentionally obtuse? It reflects poorly on you, in any case. You owe me an apology.

Ruckabumpkus

You’re the one who’s being obtuse. My reply was to more than just that one comment of yours. In other comments you made, you praised the rhetoric of a degenerate who used that terminology in as a thinly veiled reference to gang rape, implying that it would be an appropriate response to a woman’s objection to gun culture. The fact that you take the side of such a misogynistic yahoo tells me everything I need to know about how thoughtful you are.

john

or the men around him.

DGJC

If you’re spouse were wise, she’d have hit the road a long time ago.
You’re an idiot.

Wiz

ROTFLMAO….KUDOS

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Why would I marry someone so obviously mentally ill as to make such a demand?

Judging by the hornets nest you seemed to have kicked with that comment, it seems you were right.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Your blind faith in the lies your masters tell you about guns and your mindless submission to their commands to loath and harass your betters drives a zealousness far worse than anything a gun owner is likely to show. Why do you insist on showing others that where there’s an intellectual paucity, there will be excessive emotion to fill the void. Are you proud of your anti-intellectualism?

Sue de Nim

Anti-intellectualism? Look in the mirror.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Aw, man!! Nailed me!!

Luke

You’re lucky he didn’t go all medieval on you and resort to the “I know you are but what am I” tactic.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Ha ha! Hate when that happens!

Cletus B Neckbeard

The one I was really worried about was “Wuh, wuh, you’re a bigger poopyhead!”

john

Infantile.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Wow. There is no compromise for freedom. But then some of you seek to limit free speech as well, but only the free speech that disagrees with your fragile closely held beliefs that fall apart when viewed in the cleansing light of reality.
Guns are not our religion but they are a natural right

Sue de Nim

Where did you get the idea I wanted to infringe on free speech? Seems like you want to infringe on my free speech right to object to what others are saying.

john

I have listened to your comments. and even if you remain ignorant of what you are trying to do, it is still readily apparent. Under RICO, you are guilty of conspiracy to deny me of my civil rights.

Sue de Nim

I’d like to see someone try to prosecute me for that. It’ll never fly. I have as much right to ridicule your ridiculous gun fetish as you have to keep and bear a needlessly large arsenal of deadly weapons.

Q: What’s the difference between an AR-15 and a codpiece?
A: One is a device designed to exaggerate a man’s sexual endowment, and the other is an archaic men’s fashion accessory.

john

This is me laughing at you. What did Alinsky say about using marginalizing to beat your opponents? FLASH: it is not working for you.

There’s no “gun culture.” There is, however, a transvestite, hoplophobic ninny culture.

John Dilligaf

And name calling from anyone is advancing the discussion how? Is that going to convince anyone that you have a valid point on anything or is it going to drive a bigger wedge between you?

I have a deep, firmly-held belief that we, as individuals, have a God-given right to defend ourselves, and that this individual right is reiterated by the second amendment by men who knew there would be people attempting to deconstruct their hard-fought gains of individual freedoms. I believe all 10 of the amendments in the bill of rights apply INDIVIDUALLY to all US Citizens, be they rootin’-tootin’, testosterone-dripping, gun totin’ cowboys, or hoplophobes, or transvestites, or ninnies.

Play nice.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Not name-calling, correct identification.

There’s nothing to discuss so pretend you’re a promoter of civility all you want but it’s my Constitution and freedoms in your sights. Don’t like hostility? Project none.

Don’t like how I responded to someone else, FOAD. Easy enough?

Sue de Nim

Did you realize that the person you were replying to is on YOUR side of this issue? But, like a religious fundamentalist anathematizing a heretic, you rebuke him for not adhering strictly enough to your understanding of the doctrine. Because he expressed disagreement with you on one point, you responded to him as if he’s an extremist on the other side. And that’s why your gun zealotry looks to me like it’s your religion.

Cletus B Neckbeard

Man! You’re in pain, aren’t you?!

I responded to him the way I did because he was weighing in on something that was obviously a two-party exchange between the two of us.

Got reading skills or socialization? Common? Core?

Really, kid, like most regressives, you seriously overestimate yourself.

Quit boring me already with your whining.

john

Agreed in principle!

john

I would say that being an antigunner is that your zealotry is just as bad. Did you even read the comments before making judgment? It does not seem so.

John Dilligaf

Way to play the long game, Neckbeard.

Sticks and stones may break my bones, but hollowpoints expand on impact.

Cletus B Neckbeard

I’m crappin’ my pants, now!

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Gun culture? You mean the 2nd Amendment. Perhaps you missed history but the forefathers thought firearms ownership was so important that it is the 2nd ammendment.

john

Shocked, they never like it when you bring that up. They do not care about the rule of law. They only want to get their way.

Only that you’ve made jackasses of yourselves by resorting to personal attacks and and using hostile, hateful, and occasionally obscene rhetoric, that you seem proud of the fact that this is your usual behavior, all of which undercuts your argument that you should be unreservedly trusted with deadly weapons.

Cletus B Neckbeard

I presented no such argument Dullard. Emotion-driven, cultural Marxist, Pavlovian dog much? You seem to be angry that you’re not getting the respect you think you deserve. Pray that you don’t. In the mean time, try supplanting emotion with mentation.

Ruckabumpkus

And so you double down on the same behavior, thus reinforcing my point.

john

BS. Care to engage in a discussion where you argue with logic and facts instead of zealotry and emotions? I am a progun zealot. , But you don’t care. Can the lies.

Ruckabumpkus

I don’t know why you’re still bothering to comment. Anyone who might have been persuaded to your point of view would have quit reading this page as soon as the yahoos on your side started with the gay bashing and misogynistic slurs. You’re going to keep failing to persuade people as long as your side fails to reign those jackasses in. But of course, you can’t do that, for two reasons: (1) they’ll whine about their rights; and (2) they’re members of your tribe, and you don’t want to appear disloyal.

Right….. overwhelmed the discussion. Seems like that author and various news outlets and other gun control groups had no problems airing their views and raising money on the shooting.

What you and they don’t like it that there is opposition and its effective.
When the gun control side stops dancing in the blood of innocents to push useless gun control measures that only infringe on the law abiding…… then we will be quiet.

john

Cargo, I am right there with you. Antigunner zealots/ fanatics do not want anything like balance or logic or facts. They only want to win, and cannot stand that somebody resists them.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

Yeah, facts have a way of overwhelming most irrationality

Barry

What a whiny article. The point seems to be that those supporting gun rights should let those wanting gun control to have a few days to dance on the graves unopposed? The interesting thing here is that the article assumes that those wanting gun control are in the right and those against it are in the wrong. That isn’t remotely true and why we will have the debate immediately. The playbook of gun control is literally to try to push through reforms in the aftermath of a tragedy because the more time that passes, the less their chance of success. Why? Because people start thinking with their heads instead of their hearts.

john

Nope. You are just losing the argument. You treat Salon like it is an impartial source????

Never happened. The concourse was under surveillance. There is nothing on tape.
She lied.
If there were threats, there would be police reports.

Shocked_and_Amazed✓ᵛᵉʳᶦᶠᶦᵉᵈ

These Brownshirts with with jugs perpetrate lies to further their agenda. Proof is where the lies are exposed, but they just tell another lie. I am also tired of hearing about all the rape that is supposedly going on at college campuses. When a girl screws a guy and then her friends make fun of her because he was a conservative, etc and she makes a false rape claim after the fact doesn’t mean rape is rampant on campuses. It merely means that the femenazis feel that they can withdraw consent hours, days and weeks after the act because their feelings changed or they want to teach the guy(s) and lesson.

Sue de Nim

“Brownshirts with jugs” — very mature rhetoric on your part.

cargosquid

I notice that you don’t care that it didn’t actually happen.

Sue de Nim

Well, I don’t know that for sure about that, but I do know that the gunolaters posting here have made misogynistic comments directed at me, which I can only interpret as intimidation. And yet you want me to believe that you law-abiding citizens are such fine, upstanding, respectable people of honor and integrity, that you should be trusted to have all the guns you want, because you harbor no ill will toward anyone.

cargosquid

Well, you want us to believe that you merely want to help people but advocate against civil liberties and use dishonesty to push an agenda, while insulting people. You started out with insults yet you decry the tone of the responses.

Sue de Nim

Of course, you never use derogatory terms for those who disagree with you, right?

cargosquid

I mock people that insult me. I don’t need insults to advance my argument.
I usually make fun of their lack of intelligence and honesty if they insult me.

Are you planning to insult me?

john

That is called deflection. Not an answer or counterargument. You know what deflection is, right?

john

She does not even have the decency to deny it.

J F Hanson

alright, lay it out for me, Pseu de :

link to a misogynistic comment I have made aboutyou.

Sue de Nim

To your credit, you haven’t done that. My disagreements with you notwithstanding, I have to admit that you’re far from the most extreme of the extremists. I’m a lot less annoyed by your obnoxious gun avatar than having a bunch of yahoos suggest they’d like to use me like a “urinal.” Let me suggest, though, that those guys are hurting your cause. You’d be more credible with folks on my side if you’d explicitly disassociate yourself from the likes of them.

John Dilligaf

And be labeled an apostate along with me…

Sue de Nim

That’s the risk you take when you say anything moderate. Extremists on either side attack you as if you’re an extremist on the other.

john

No worse rhetoric than yours.

john

Yes, Mother Jones and Rolling Stone are both great advocates for truth and justice.

cargosquid

So…getting back to the actual article topic…yes…gun makers should be allowed to create handguns that look like cellphones. Everyone has the right to be stupid.

If they want to sell overly complicated stuff, with limited defense capability, that’s their business. It is such a niche market, I can’t imagine that it will make enough money to stay on the market.

Seems the decline in violent crime since the early ’90s can be almost entirely explained by factors other than the passage of “shall issue” laws.

john

sophistry. Of course, since it supports your view, you embrace it. Only natural, but it does not add validity to what you say.

Gary F

Think Bernie can beat Hillary in NY?
Why aren’t we hearing more from the Super Delegates?
I would presume more and more of them should be feeling the Bern?

Gary F

It’s getting ugly with Bernie and Hillary. What happens when Bernie beats Hillary in New York? Will the super delegates actually vote for Bernie? If Hillary gets nasty against Bernie will Bernie supporters stay home come election time? Should NPR/MPR start interviewing the super delegates?

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